Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!deimos!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!tank!sophist!goer
From: goer@sophist.uucp (Richard Goerwitz)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: tar format
Summary: how to determine the position of the next header block
Message-ID: <7723@tank.uchicago.edu>
Date: 20 Feb 90 22:40:03 GMT
Sender: news@tank.uchicago.edu
Reply-To: goer@sophist.UUCP (Richard Goerwitz)
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Chicago
Lines: 11

I looked through the man page on my local system describing the tar
header format, and I cannot figure out how exactly to determine the
byte position of the next header.  Clearly there is a size field,
but the values I get for it seem not to reflect the precise file
length, even taking the preposed header into account.  I am sure that
the answer to this question is simple, but so far it is not obvious
to me.  Just how do I utilize each tar header to know how far to seek
in order to move up to the next header?

   -Richard L. Goerwitz              goer%sophist@uchicago.bitnet
   goer@sophist.uchicago.edu         rutgers!oddjob!gide!sophist!goer