(tar) create dir

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 Archiving Directories
 ---------------------
 
    You can archive a directory by specifying its directory name as a
 file name argument to `tar'.  The files in the directory will be
 archived relative to the working directory, and the directory will be
 re-created along with its contents when the archive is extracted.
 
    To archive a directory, first move to its superior directory.  If you
 have followed the previous instructions in this tutorial, you should
 type:
 
      $ cd ..
      $
 
 This will put you into the directory which contains `practice', i.e.
 your home directory.  Once in the superior directory, you can specify
 the subdirectory, `practice', as a file name argument.  To store
 `practice' in the new archive file `music.tar', type:
 
      $ tar --create --verbose --file=music.tar practice
 
 `tar' should output:
 
      practice/
      practice/blues
      practice/folk
      practice/jazz
      practice/collection.tar
 
    Note that the archive thus created is not in the subdirectory
 `practice', but rather in the current working directory--the directory
 from which `tar' was invoked.  Before trying to archive a directory
 from its superior directory, you should make sure you have write access
 to the superior directory itself, not only the directory you are trying
 archive with `tar'.  For example, you will probably not be able to
 store your home directory in an archive by invoking `tar' from the root
 directory;  absolute.  (Note also that `collection.tar', the
 original archive file, has itself been archived.  `tar' will accept any
 file as a file to be archived, regardless of its content.  When
 `music.tar' is extracted, the archive file `collection.tar' will be
 re-written into the file system).
 
    If you give `tar' a command such as
 
      $ tar --create --file=foo.tar .
 
 `tar' will report `tar: ./foo.tar is the archive; not dumped'.  This
 happens because `tar' creates the archive `foo.tar' in the current
 directory before putting any files into it.  Then, when `tar' attempts
 to add all the files in the directory `.' to the archive, it notices
 that the file `./foo.tar' is the same as the archive `foo.tar', and
 skips it.  (It makes no sense to put an archive into itself.)  GNU
 `tar' will continue in this case, and create the archive normally,
 except for the exclusion of that one file.  (_Please note:_ Other
 versions of `tar' are not so clever; they will enter an infinite loop
 when this happens, so you should not depend on this behavior unless you
 are certain you are running GNU `tar'.)
 

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