Helios brings 'tar' unix tool to Mac OS X
updated 02:05 am EDT, Mon March 12, 2007
'Tar' unix tool for OS X
Germany-based HELIOS Software has released the Intel-compatible version of its free backup tool HELIOS Xtar. HELIOS, which provides cross-platform networking, PDF, and image server solutions, says it passing along on "its accumulated development experience to the Open Source community in the form of the free Xtar tool, which is basically the UNIX 'tar' program extended by HELIOS to include full Mac OS X (PPC/Intel) compatibility." HELIOS Xtar for Mac, available for both PowerPC- and Intel-based Macs, stores each HFS file as a double file in the standard "tar" format. Unicode file names as well as all meta data, including creation and modification date‹are preserved. During the restore with Xtar to an HFS volume, the Finder and resource information are written into a valid HFS file--preserving all Mac OS X specific meta data are to ensure that all volumes are bootable after the restore.
The company says that 'HELIOS Xtar' can be used as a tool for cloning Mac OS X system drives. In HELIOS server installations, Xtar performs data migration from Mac OS X systems to HELIOS volumes and vice versa, while the company's HELIOS htar, its commercial "tar" tool, preserves Mac meta data even on restoring data to HELIOS volumes under Windows. The htar tool is part of the HELIOS UB server suite for Windows, which has been available since the end of the year 2006.
"It is a HELIOS Software tradition to share our development know-how with the community in the form of free tools," explained Helmut Tschemernjak, CEO and president of HELIOS. For example, HELIOS LanTest is used worldwide as a standard tool for measuring network data throughput. ³Likewise, HELIOS File System Test, is a tool used frequently as a neutral reference to verify the Mac OS X compatibility of file systems,² noted Tschemernjak.
