^ Command   ^ Explanation       |       
| -z        | unzip             |    
| -x        | extract file      |   
| -v        | verbose           |  
| -f        | Force             |
| -t        | table of contents |

=== Create Tar with Gzip Compression ===
<sxh bash>
tar -cvzf filename.tar.gz directoryORfileToCompress 
</sxh>
\\
Compress with date in filename
<sxh bash>
tar -cvzf filename.$(date +"%Y-%m-%d").tar.gz directoryORfileToCompress 
</sxh>
\\
=== Test the contents of an archive ===
The following command can be used to view the contents of an archive. You can then decide if you wish to strip a component when uncompressing 
<sxh bash>
tar tvf filename.tar.gz
</sxh>
\\
=== Extract ===

<sxh bash>
tar -xzvf filename.tar.gz
</sxh>