7zip question for a bash script.

[Argedion]

I need to save a few folders from my phone's sdcard over to my harddrive. I have a bash already but want to make it a bit more usable for my needs. One of this issues I'm having with this is a proper command for 7zip in compressing a folder contents and then saving the compressed folder content on to the hard drive. Problem is I don't know the physical name of the folder I wish to save.

Example

I have directory /SDCARD/ConstantNameFolder/BDCES-*-*/*.*

so the first part of the directory I know the name however the last part that starts with BDCES is always changing depending on the date and time it was created so a normal look would be (BDCES-20120404-2021) I want to do this in a bash file because Its really easier to let the file run and copy everything over to the appropriate place on the Hard drive than it is for me to drag and drop. This way I can backup the contents of the card and do other things I need to do.

I've tried doing commands like this
7z -r /media/Storage/Phone/Nandroid/12345/BDCES-*-*/BDCES-*-*.7z /SDCARD/Nandroid/12345/
I get Error Incorrect Command Line

TIA

Argedion

[stevea]

See "man 7z" command.
You nee a function letter (like 'a' for add) as the first argument.

Ther eare warnings about using '-r', but I don't know the meaning.
The arg after the '-r' is an archive name and you may not want the '*' wildcard chars there

[Gareth Jones]

Ditto what stevea said.

Also, unless you have a good reason to use 7z, I'd recommend using Linux-native tools. If you need 7z's LZMA2 compression, the xz command does that:

tar cf - $dir | xz -9e > $backup.tar.xz

You can extract it with the graphical tool of your choice, or run:

tar xf $backup.tar.xz

If you do want to use 7z, I think the proper command is "7z a $backup.7z $sourcedir" ('a' for add, no '-r' needed – see the warning stevea mentioned).

---------- Post added at 02:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:42 AM ----------

Originally Posted by Argedion

I have directory /SDCARD/ConstantNameFolder/BDCES-*-*/*.*

If I understand correctly, "*.*" is supposed to match all files inside the BDCES-* directory? That's a DOS-ism, and not how it works in Linux: "*" matches all (non-hidden) files, but in this case you're better off working with the directory name directly.

I've tried doing commands like this
7z -r /media/Storage/Phone/Nandroid/12345/BDCES-*-*/BDCES-*-*.7z /SDCARD/Nandroid/12345/
I get Error Incorrect Command Line

The *'s in the .7z file name won't do anything here, as the 7z files haven't been created.

I'm not sure I quite understand what you want to do, but here's my suggestion (NOT TESTED!):

# Set these variables as you need.
source_dir="/media/Phone"
backup_dir="/media/Storage/Phone Backups"

pushd "$source_dir"
for dir in BDCES-*
do
    tar cf - "$dir" | xz -9e > "$backup_dir/$dir.tar.xz"
    # 7z a "$backup_dir/$dir.7z" "$dir"
done
popd

[Argedion]

Originally Posted by stevea

See "man 7z" command.
You nee a function letter (like 'a' for add) as the first argument.

Ther eare warnings about using '-r', but I don't know the meaning.
The arg after the '-r' is an archive name and you may not want the '*' wildcard chars there

yeah i forgot the a also found out that i need to seperate the a from the 7z so instead of 7za i needed to use 7z a. So that part of my problem is solved now i need to figure out how to get the name and then save it to the harddrive with out affecting the other files that are also in the saved directory

I need to get a list of the child directory's then maybe save them as an array name or something

7z a /media/Storage/Phone/Nandroid/12345/BDCES-*-*/BDCES-$Date-(Numb).7z /SDCARD/Nandroid/12345/

any suggestions on how i can work that? I would like to do a variable so
instead of BDCES-*-*.zip maybe
NandFile(x)=BDCES-*-*
NandCompres =BDCES-date-(x).zip

---------- Post added at 10:07 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:01 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Gareth Jones

Ditto what stevea said.

Also, unless you have a good reason to use 7z, I'd recommend using Linux-native tools. If you need 7z's LZMA2 compression, the xz command does that:

tar cf - $dir | xz -9e > $backup.tar.xz

You can extract it with the graphical tool of your choice, or run:

tar xf $backup.tar.xz

If you do want to use 7z, I think the proper command is "7z a $backup.7z $sourcedir" ('a' for add, no '-r' needed – see the warning stevea mentioned).

---------- Post added at 02:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:42 AM ----------



If I understand correctly, "*.*" is supposed to match all files inside the BDCES-* directory? That's a DOS-ism, and not how it works in Linux: "*" matches all (non-hidden) files, but in this case you're better off working with the directory name directly.



The *'s in the .7z file name won't do anything here, as the 7z files haven't been created.

I'm not sure I quite understand what you want to do, but here's my suggestion (NOT TESTED!):

# Set these variables as you need.
source_dir="/media/Phone"
backup_dir="/media/Storage/Phone Backups"

pushd "$source_dir"
for dir in BDCES-*
do
    tar cf - "$dir" | xz -9e > "$backup_dir/$dir.tar.xz"
    # 7z a "$backup_dir/$dir.7z" "$dir"
done
popd

The main reason for doing it in 7zip is for when I'm in computer land hell I think they call it Windows. I find that 7zip is easier to use between the two OS'S

[Gareth Jones]

Originally Posted by Argedion

[...] then save it to the harddrive with out affecting the other files that are also in the saved directory
[...]
The main reason for doing it in 7zip is for when I'm in computer land hell I think they call it Windows. I find that 7zip is easier to use between the two OS'S

In light of these two points, I'll amend my suggestion slightly:

# Set these variables as you need.
source_dir="/media/Phone"
backup_dir="/media/Storage/Phone Backups"

pushd "$source_dir"
for dir in BDCES-*
do
    # Assume that if a backup already exists,
    # it doesn't need recreating or updating.
    backup="$backup_dir/$dir.7z"
    [[ -f "$backup" ]] || 7z a "$backup" "$dir"
done
popd

[Argedion]

Thank you kind sirs. When I return home from work I will try this out and report back how it all went for me.

[Argedion]

ok none of that seemed to work all i got zipped was the folder names and nothing in them it took all of two seconds to make. I've tried some variations but no luck with that either. So still working on this problem.

[Gareth Jones]

I ran "7z a dir.7z dir" on a test dir, and it does archive the contents of the directory too.

Try changing the line to "echo 7z a ..." – this will print the commands that the script would run to the terminal instead of actually running them. Check that the commands shown have the intended arguments.