[This pre-README pertains to the 1.11.8 release only]

This release is being made explicitely for complying with the
CDROM deadline of June 1995, that is, sooner than even 1.11.7 was
initially scheduled.  So, sad to say, a few portability reports
against 1.11.6 are still pending in 1.11.8.  None is lost, however!
(For maintainers: Makefile.in engineering is not fully up-to-date.)

A Texinfo manual is provided, but in a very draft state.  Many users
want documentation, and even a draft manual is better than nothing.
Please be kind to us, the manual will surely improve before 1.12.

GNU `tar' is also a testbed for message localization as provided by
the GNU `gettext' tool set.  I decided to leave this in for 1.11.8.
Unless you feel like working on remaining problems, I suggest that
you use either `--disable-nls' or `--with-gnu-nls' on the `configure'
call.  See file `NLS' for more information on these matters.

I roughly estimate that 40% of the 1.11.2 problem backlog is solved
in 1.11.8.  The extensive diffsets contributed by Ian Jackson and
Piercarlo Grandi are not fully processed, as I want to be overly
careful at not breaking things while doing so.  *Many* other people
contributed reports and solutions, I'm heartedly thanking them all.


[This pre-README pertains to the 1.11.X series, with X > 2]

This is a beta test version for GNU `tar' 1.12, which will be a
bug fix release.  The emphasis is still on solving portability
problems, rather than execution bugs or requests for enhancements.

You should have received mail if a problem you submitted has been
solved.  If you fear your report has been lost, please check file
`BACKLOG' in the distribution.  It is not useful resubmitting a
bug report for which a trace still exists in `BACKLOG'.

The default archive device is now `stdin' on read and `stdout'
on write.  The installer can still override this by presetting
`DEFAULT_ARCHIVE' in the environment before configuring (the
behavior of `-[0-7]' or `-[0-7]lmh' options in `tar' are then
derived automatically).  Similarly, `DEFAULT_BLOCKING' can be preset
to something else than 20.


[The usual README follows]

GNU `tar' saves many files together into a single tape or disk
archive, and can restore individual files from the archive.
It includes multivolume support, the ability to archive sparse files,
automatic archive compression/decompression, remote archives and
special features that allow `tar' to be used for incremental and
full backups.  This distribution also includes `rmt', the remote
tape server.  The `mt' tape drive control program is in the GNU
`cpio' distribution.

GNU `tar' is based heavily on John Gilmore's public domain `tar'.
Unfortunately, GNU `tar' implements an early draft of the POSIX
1003.1 `ustar' standard which is different from the final standard.
Adding support for the new changes in a backward-compatible fashion
is not trivial.

See file `BACKLOG' for a summary of pending mail and articles.
See file `COPYING' for copying conditions.
See file `INSTALL' for compilation and installation instructions.
See file `NEWS' for a list of major changes in the current release.
See file `NLS' for how to customize this program to your language.
See file `THANKS' for a list of contributors.

The scripts used at the FSF for doing all our backups are included.
Use them for making incremental dumps, instead of using --incremental
(-G), --after-date (-N) or --newer-mtime.  The only option that
works correctly for incremental backups is --listed-incremental.
However, when extracting incremental dumps, use --incremental (-G).

Various people have been having problems using floppies on a NeXT.  In
order to have them work right, you need to kill the automounting
program which tries to mount floppies as soon as they are added.

Besides those configure options documented in files `INSTALL' and
`NLS', a few extra options may be accepted after `./configure':

* `--with-dmalloc' is a debugging option for looking memory management
problems, it prerequires Gray Watson's package, which is available
as `ftp://ftp.letters.com/src/dmalloc/dmalloc.tar.gz'.

* `--with-regex' tells the installation to use the older regex
package, instead of Tom Lord's GNU `rx' regular expression package.

Send bug reports to `bug-gnu-utils@prep.ai.mit.edu'.  A bug report is
an adequate description of the problem: your input, what you expected,
what you got, and why this is wrong.  Diffs are welcome, but they only
describe a solution, from which the problem might be uneasy to infer.
