Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
Path: gmd.de!nntp.gmd.de!dearn!xlink.net!howland.reston.ans.net!EU.net!ieunet!tcdcs!rwallace
From: rwallace@cs.tcd.ie (Russell Wallace)
Subject: Re: Archives on FTP.GMD.DE
Message-ID: <1994Apr15.182845.519@cs.tcd.ie>
Organization: Computer Science, Trinity College Dublin
References: <51744.ams1628@slinky.univnorthco.edu>
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 1994 18:28:45 GMT
Lines: 21

<ams1628@slinky.univnorthco.edu> writes:

>This questions isn't really related to interactive fiction per se, but more
>a desire to see what has transpired on this newsgroup before I started
>reading.  I noticed that archives of this newsgroup on FTP.GMD.DE, but they
>are tar'ed, and I am using an MSDOS-based PC.  Is there a utility to un-tar
>files on a PC so that I can read the old messages?  I have found the Gnu
>project's Gzip, but that will only compress and decompress.  Any help will
>be greatly appreciated (and I can start reading and learning sooner!).

I find that tar works so rarely (both the Unix and PC versions) I've
given up even trying to use it.  The best way to extract tar files,
provided the contents are ASCII, is to simply run the thing through a
program that strips out all non-ASCII characters, the result is a
concatenation of the contents in a text file (with a few extra bits of
junk thrown in).

--
"To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem"
Russell Wallace, Trinity College, Dublin
rwallace@cs.tcd.ie
