cpio

Copy files in and out of archives. Supports the following archive formats: cpio's custom binary, old ASCII, new ASCII, crc, HPUX binary, HPUX old ASCII, old tar, and POSIX.1 tar. More information: https://www.gnu.org/software/cpio.

  • Take a list of file names from stdin and add them [o]nto an archive in cpio's binary format:

echo "path/to/file1 path/to/file2 …" | cpio -o > archive.cpio

  • Copy all files and directories in a directory and add them [o]nto an archive, in [v]erbose mode:

find path/to/directory | cpio -ov > archive.cpio

  • P[i]ck all files from an archive, generating [d]irectories where needed, in [v]erbose mode:

cpio -idv < archive.cpio