NAME Archive::Ar::Libarchive - Interface for manipulating ar archives with libarchive VERSION version 0.12 SYNOPSIS use Archive::Ar::Libarchive; my $ar = Archive::Ar->new('libfoo.a'); $ar->add_data('newfile.txt', 'some contents', { uid => 101, gid => 102 }); $ar->add_files('./bar.tar.gz', 'bat.pl'); $ar->remove('file1', 'file2'); my $content = $ar->get_content('file3')->{data}; my @files = $ar->list_files; $ar->write('libbar.a'); my @file_list = $ar->list_files; DESCRIPTION This module is a XS alternative to Archive::Ar that uses libarchive to read and write ar BSD, GNU and common ar archives. There is no standard for the ar format. Most modern archives are based on a common format with two extension variants, BSD and GNU. Other esoteric variants (such as AIX (small), AIX (big) and Coherent) vary significantly from the common format and are not supported. Debian's package format (.deb files) use the common format. The interface attempts to be identical (with a couple of minor extensions) to Archive::Ar and the documentation presented here is based on that module. The diagnostic messages issued on error mostly come directly from libarchive, so they will likely not match exactly what Archive::Ar would produce, but it should issue a warning (when Archive::Ar::Libarchive#DEBUG is turned on) under similar circumstances. The main advantage of Archive::Ar over this module is that it is written in pure perl, and thus does not require a compiler or libarchive. The advantage of this module (at least as of this writing) is that it supports GNU (read) and BSD (read and write) extensions for longer member filenames. As an XS module using libarchive it may also be faster. METHODS new my $ar = Archive::Ar::Libarchive->new; my $ar = Archive::Ar::Libarchive->new($filename); my $ar = Archive::Ar::Libarchive->new($fh, $debug); Returns a new Archive::AR::Libarchive object. Without a filename or glob, it returns an empty object. If passed a filename as a scalar or a GLOB, it will attempt to populate from either of those sources. If it fails, you will receive undef, instead of an object reference. This also can take a second optional debugging parameter. This acts exactly as if Archive::Ar::Libarchive#DEBUG is called on the object before it is returned. If you have a Archive::Ar::Libarchive#new that keeps failing, this should help. read my $br = $ar->read($filename); my $br = $ar->read($fh); This reads a new file into the object, removing any ar archive already represented in the object. Returns the number of bytes read, undef on failure. read_memory my $br = $ar->read_memory($data); This reads information from the first parameter, and attempts to parse and treat it like an ar archive. Like Archive::Ar::Libarchive#read, it will wipe out whatever you have in the object and replace it with the contents of the new archive, even if it fails. Returns the number of bytes read (processed) if successful, undef otherwise. list_files my @list = $ar->list_files; my $list = $ar->list_files; This lists the files contained inside of the archive by filename, as an array. If called in a scalar context, returns a reference to an array. add_files $ar->add_files(@filenames); $ar->add_files(\@filenames); Takes an array or an arrayref of filenames to add to the ar archive, in order. The filenames can be paths to files, in which case the path information is stripped off. Filenames longer than 16 characters are truncated when written to disk in the format, so keep that in mind when adding files. Due to the nature of the ar archive format, Archive::Ar::Libarchive#add_files will store the uid, gid, mode, size, and creation date of the file as returned by stat. returns the number of files successfully added, or undef on failure. add_data my $size = $ar->add_data($filename, $data, $filedata); Takes an filename and a set of data to represent it. Unlike Archive::Ar::Libarchive#add_files, Archive::Ar::Libarchive#add_data is a virtual add, and does not require data on disk to be present. The data is a hash that looks like: $filedata = { uid => $uid, #defaults to zero gid => $gid, #defaults to zero date => $date, #date in epoch seconds. Defaults to now. mode => $mode, #defaults to 0100644; }; You cannot add_data over another file however. This returns the file length in bytes if it is successful, undef otherwise. write my $content = $ar->write; my $size = $ar->write($filename); This method will return the data as an .ar archive, or will write to the filename present if specified. If given a filename, Archive::Ar::Libarchive#write will return the length of the file written, in bytes, or undef on failure. If the filename already exists, it will overwrite that file. get_content my $hash = get_content($filename); This returns a hash with the file content in it, including the data that the file would naturally contain. If the file does not exist or no filename is given, this returns undef. On success, a hash is returned with the following keys: name The file name date The file date (in epoch seconds) uid The uid of the file gid The gid of the file mode The mode permissions size The size (in bytes) of the file data The contained data remove my $count = $ar->remove(@pathnames); my $count = $ar->remove(\@pathnames); The remove method takes a filenames as a list or as an arrayref, and removes them, one at a time, from the Archive::Ar object. This returns the number of files successfully removed from the archive. set_output_format_bsd $ar->set_output_format_bsd; Sets the output format produced by Archive::Ar::Libarchive#write to use BSD format. Note: this method is not available in Archive::Ar. set_output_format_svr4 $ar->set_output_format_svr4; Sets the output format produced by Archive::Ar::Libarchive#write to System VR4 format. Note: this method is not available in Archive::Ar. DEBUG $ar->DEBUG; $ar->DEBUG(0); This method turns on debugging. To Turn off pass a false value in as the argument. SEE ALSO Alien::Libarchive Archive::Ar AUTHOR Graham Ollis COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE This software is copyright (c) 2013 by Graham Ollis. This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.