tar.gz and tar.bz2 files of linux kernel on ftp.kernel.org

tar.gz and tar.bz2 files of linux kernel on ftp.kernel.org

[Tarkan Erimer]

Why there are two different (tar.gz and tar.bz2) kind of compressed 
linux kernel on ftp.kernel.org ?

One kind of (.tar.bz2 or .tar.xz etc.) compressed file, probably, will 
be enough for everybody. Personally, I always download the .tar.bz2 one 
because of its shorter file length compared to .tar.gz. If it's needed 
to have two different kind of compressed linux kernel because of some 
extraordinary situations, maybe we have to consider other better options 
like .tar.xz for instance. I did a quick comparison between .tar.bz2 and 
tar.xz compressed linux-2.6.36. Here is what I found :

linux-a9un:/home/tarkane/Downloads # ls -alh linux-2.6.36.tar.*
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 68M Oct 21 09:14 linux-2.6.36.tar.bz2
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 59M Oct 28 09:54 linux-2.6.36.tar.xz
linux-a9un:/home/tarkane/Downloads #

As seen above, .tar.xz has better ratio (%13.24 smaller sized file than 
.tar.bz2.) than the .tar.bz2 one. So,if it could be an, at least, an 
option to offer .tar.xz compressed kernel, we could have the following 
benefits :

- Better usage of ftp.kernel.org's and downloaders' (Some people use 
bandwidth limited Internet connections.) internet bandwidth.
- Better disk space usage on ftp.kernel.org servers due to more smaller 
file sizes.
- It will reduce the load on ftp.kernel.org servers due to shorter 
download times.

I will be happy to hear your opinions about it. :-)

Tarkan

Re: tar.gz and tar.bz2 files of linux kernel on ftp.kernel.org

[Mikael Abrahamsson]

On Thu, 28 Oct 2010, Tarkan Erimer wrote:

> Why there are two different (tar.gz and tar.bz2) kind of compressed linux 
> kernel on ftp.kernel.org ?

<http://lwn.net/Articles/374776/>

There has been a lot of discussion about this, it was deemed to be best to 
let the users choose what version they wanted and provide both.

-- 
Mikael Abrahamsson    email: swmike@swm.pp.se