To create a compressed tar file: tar -cvf

To uncompress a tar file: tar -xvf

c=compress x=extract z=zip-format v=verbose (optional) f=file (must be last)

Examples: Create:

tar -czvf mystuff.tgz mystuff/

tar -cvzf file.tar.gz inputfile1 inputfile2

Extract: tar -xzvf mystuff.tgz tar -xvzf file.tar.gz