Mac OS X users

Mac OS X will unpack a .tar.gz, .tar, or .zip file automatically when you double-click on its icon. (Note that it may be necessary to unpack some files twice.)

If you would rather follow the UNIX-style instructions below you can use the Terminal command-line application, which can be found in your Utilities folder.

Unpacking .tar.gz files

First, ensure that you have a shell running and cd to the same directory as the downloaded file. To unpack a .tar.gz file, say foo.tar.gz, use the following command:

gunzip -c foo.tar.gz | tar xopf -

The newly extracted files will be created in the current directory. If you also wish to see a list of the files as they are extracted, instead use the command

gunzip -c foo.tar.gz | tar xopft -

Unpacking .tar files

First, ensure that you have a shell running and cd to the same directory as the downloaded file. To unpack a .tar file, say foo.tar, use the following command:

tar xopf foo.tar

The newly extracted files will be created in the current directory. If you also wish to see a list of the files as they are extracted, instead use the command

tar xopft foo.tar

Unpacking .zip files

Most modern Windows environments already know how to unpack .zip files. If this is the case, the icon for the .zip file should look like a normal folder icon with a zipper on it. To extract the files within, right click on the file and select the “Extract All” option.

If using a version of Windows without inbuilt support for .zip files, you will need to download a zip file extractor such as JustZIPIt or the Info-ZIP tools. Refer to the documentation provided with whichever program you choose for further instructions.

If, for some reason, you wish to unpack the .zip files on a non-Windows platform, this is possible. Your operating system may already have a copy of the unzip program (or similar); otherwise it may be downloaded from the Info-ZIP website. Since the files in the .zip archives use Windows-style line terminators, you will need to pass the -a option to unzip in order to extract them with UNIX-style line terminators (also needed for Mac OS X). For instance, to extract files from the file foo.zip, use the following command:

unzip -a foo.zip