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ar
on the Command Linear [-X32_64
] [-
]p[mod [relpos] [count]] archive [member...]
When you use ar
in the Unix style, ar
insists on at least two arguments to execute: one keyletter specifying the operation (optionally accompanied by other keyletters specifying modifiers), and the archive name to act on.
Most operations can also accept further member arguments, specifying particular files to operate on.
GNU ar
allows you to mix the operation code p and modifier flags mod in any order, within the first command-line argument.
If you wish, you may begin the first command-line argument with a dash.
The p keyletter specifies what operation to execute; it may be any of the following, but you must specify only one of them:
d
If you specify the v
modifier, ar
lists each module as it is deleted.
m
The ordering of members in an archive can make a difference in how programs are linked using the library, if a symbol is defined in more than one member.
If no modifiers are used with m
, any members you name in the member arguments are moved to the end of the archive; you can use the a
, b
, or i
modifiers to move them to a specified place instead.
p
v
modifier is specified, show the member name before copying its contents to standard output.
If you specify no member arguments, all the files in the archive are printed.
q
The modifiers a
, b
, and i
do not affect this operation; new members are always placed at the end of the archive.
The modifier v
makes ar
list each file as it is appended.
Since the point of this operation is speed, the archive's symbol table index is not updated, even if it already existed; you can use ar s
or ranlib
explicitly to update the symbol table index.
However, too many different systems assume quick append rebuilds the index, so GNU ar
implements q
as a synonym for r
.
r
q
in that any previously existing members are deleted if their names match those being added.
If one of the files named in member... does not exist, ar
displays an error message, and leaves undisturbed any existing members of the archive matching that name.
By default, new members are added at the end of the file; but you may use one of the modifiers a
, b
, or i
to request placement relative to some existing member.
The modifier v
used with this operation elicits a line of output for each file inserted, along with one of the letters a
or r
to indicate whether the file was appended (no old member deleted) or replaced.
t
v
modifier.
If you do not specify a member, all files in the archive are listed.
If there is more than one file with the same name (say, fie
) in an archive (say b.a
), ar t b.a fie
lists only the first instance; to see them all, you must ask for a complete listing--in our example, ar t b.a
.
x
v
modifier with this operation, to request that ar
list each name as it extracts it.
If you do not specify a member, all files in the archive are extracted.
A number of modifiers (mod) may immediately follow the p keyletter, to specify variations on an operation's behavior:
a
a
, the name of an existing archive member must be present as the relpos argument, before the archive specification.b
b
, the name of an existing archive member must be present as the relpos argument, before the archive specification. (same as i
).c
f
ar
will normally permit file names of any length. This will cause it to create archives which are not compatible with the native ar
program on some systems. If this is a concern, the f
modifier may be used to truncate file names when putting them in the archive.i
i
, the name of an existing archive member must be present as the relpos argument, before the archive specification. (same as b
).l
N
o
P
ar
can not create an archive with a full path name (such archives are not POSIX complaint), but other archive creators can. This option will cause GNU ar
to match file names using a complete path name, which can be convenient when extracting a single file from an archive created by another tool.s
ar s
on an archive is equivalent to running ranlib
on it.S
S
modifier on the last execution of ar
, or you must run ranlib
on the archive.u
ar r
... inserts all files listed into the archive. If you would like to insert only those of the files you list that are newer than existing members of the same names, use this modifier. The u
modifier is allowed only for the operation r
(replace). In particular, the combination qu
is not allowed, since checking the timestamps would lose any speed advantage from the operation q
.v
v
is appended.V
ar
.ar
ignores an initial option spelt -X32_64
, for compatibility with AIX. The behaviour produced by this option is the default for GNU ar
. ar
does not support any of the other -X
options; in particular, it does not support -X32
which is the default for AIX ar
.