stuffr-cli

The stuffr command — a universal compression and archive toolkit in Rust, one command for the whole format space.

Install

The binary is called stuffr, but it is built from the stuffr-cli package, so that is the name cargo install needs:

cargo install stuffr-cli        # installs the `stuffr` binary

cargo install stuffr does not work — stuffr is the library crate and has no binary target. (Same arrangement as ripgrep's ripgrep / rg.)

The default build is pure Rust and needs no C toolchain. To link the two vendored C backends instead — a faster xz/LZMA encoder and a strong zstd encoder:

cargo install stuffr-cli --features c-backed    # needs a C compiler, nothing else

The five legacy formats (Unix compress .Z, LHA/LZH, ARJ, ARC/PAK, ZOO) are in the default build too, pure Rust like the rest of it — no extra flag needed. compress, lha and arj read AND write as of Phase 3c (lha reads seven compression methods and writes -lh5-; arj reads five and writes only the uncompressed one, so an ARJ archive stuffr writes is larger than its input — and nothing outside this project has ever read one, since no arj/unarj tool is obtainable); arc and zoo are read-only and refuse pack --format <name> at exit 3. --features legacy still exists and still works; it only matters paired with --no-default-features (e.g. --no-default-features --features pure, the build the purity CI job checks, is the one combination that excludes them).

Use

stuffr pack proj -o backup.tar.gz       # walk a directory, container over codec
stuffr list backup.tar.gz               # index, mode, size, name
stuffr unpack backup.tar.gz -C out/     # path containment and bomb limits on by default
stuffr cat logs.tar.zst app.log         # stream one entry to stdout
stuffr info archive.xz                  # resolved chain, ladder rung, fidelity
stuffr test archive.zip                 # integrity check, no extraction
stuffr formats                          # capability matrix for THIS build
stuffr --examples                       # worked examples for every verb

- means stdin everywhere, so curl … | stuffr cat - | grep pattern works.

Twelve codecs — gzip, zlib, deflate, bzip2, brotli, lz4, snappy, zstd, xz, lzma, lzip and Unix compress (.Z), all round-trip — and eight containers: tar, ar, cpio (newc only), zip/zip64, lha and arj are six round-trip containers, and arc/PAK and zoo are two read-only containers. That is what a plain cargo install stuffr-cli gives you; stuffr formats prints the matrix for the build you actually have.

Invoked as bzip2, bunzip2, bzcat, bzip2recover, gzip, gunzip, zcat or gzcat, the binary behaves as that tool, byte for byte on stdout, stderr and exit codes. stuffr install-links --dir DIR makes the links, and nothing makes them for you. The gzip names follow the platform (GNU gzip, or Apple's on macOS and the BSDs); STUFFR_GZIP_FLAVOR=gnu|bsd overrides that.

Full documentation, including the safety defaults and the two build tiers, is in the project README.

License

MIT, with ported code under other permissive licences: the crate's metadata is MIT AND bzip2-1.0.6 AND BSD-2-Clause AND BSD-3-Clause. The notices ship as LICENSE-bzip2 and LICENSE-gzip-bsd.