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windowscmdtar

Use tar to extract files from an archive with an unknown name

I would like to use tar (on Windows) in a command line to extract files from an archive, that has a variable name, like *-archive.zip, that I don't know beforehand. I haven't found a way to use a wildcard for the targeted archive name, is there an option to do that ?

I have tried things like tar -xf "*-archive.zip", but it searches for a file with the same exact name, not the pattern.

Thanks.

Solution

  • The proper solution is (as Mofi suggested) :

    for %I in (*-archive.zip) do tar.exe -xf "%I"

    But what I ended up doing is switching to PowerShell, and ditching tar that cannot handle PowerShell pipes. The final command is :

    Get-ChildItem -Name -Filter *-archive.zip | Expand-Archive

    It works provided there is only one file matching the pattern in the current working folder.