Jukka Marin <jmarin@pyy.jmp.fi> wrote:

> Was trying to copy /dev using tar and noticed that tar (in 1.5R) doesn't
> understand big device minor numbers.  raid0i has minor number of 524288,
> which became 0 .. 

Looks like another GNU tar bug to me:

# mknod test c 64 524288
# /usr/bin/tar cf test.tar test
# /bin/pax -vf test.tar
crw-r--r--  1 root     nemeton   64,   0 Mar 19 21:44 test
pax: ustar vol 1, 1 files, 10240 bytes read, 0 bytes written in 1 secs (10240 bytes/sec)
# /bin/pax -w -x ustar -f test.pax test
# /bin/pax -vf test.pax
crw-r--r--  1 root     nemeton   64,524288 Mar 19 21:44 test
pax: ustar vol 1, 1 files, 10240 bytes read, 0 bytes written in 1 secs (10240 bytes/sec)

You might file a PR against tar and investigate using pax instead.

Someone (matt green?) was hoping once to replace GNU tar with
pax-as-tar.  This isn't easy while users are more attached to GNU tar
extensions than they are concerned by GNU tar bugs ... :-(

Regards,

Giles