ar86(1)

NAME
ar86 - Create, modify, and extract from archive file

SYNOPSIS
ar86 operation archive [file...]

ar86 positional-op member archive [file...]

DESCRIPTION
The ar86 program is used to create, examine and modify archive files produced by the Dev86/ELKS toolchain.

OPTIONS
The ar86 command requires that the operation to be performed on the archive be specified as the first option. If the operation is positional then the next option is the archive member marking the position. This is followed by the archive file name and any list of file names.

  Operations
One of the following operations can be specified

d   delete the listed files from the archive.

m   move the named files. By default files are moved to the end of the archive unless a positional modifier is present.

p   print the contents of archive members to standard out. If a file list is included only those members are printed. If the v modifier is present each file's contents are preceded by a new line, a line with the string member, a space character, the member name, and two following newlines.

q   quickly add the files to the end of the archive without checking to see if they already exist in the archive. This operation will ignore any positional modifiers. Creates the archive file if it does not exist.

r   replace archive members with the files listed. If the file name is not present in the archive it is added to the end of the archive (or to any explicitly specified position). Creates the archive file if it does not exist.

t   table; list the file names of archive members. If a file list is present only those files that are present in the archive are listed. The v modifier prints member attributes.

x   extract the named files from the archive into the current directory. If no files are specified all the archive members will be extracted.

  Modifiers
The following modifiers may be used with the operations

o   original time stamps from the archive are preserved for extracted files when possible.

s   symbol update; this option may be used by itself to force an update to the symbol definition section of the archive (the __.SYMDEF member). If any files are specified they will be replaced as if the r operation had been specified. If no symbol definition section exists one is created. This option will also creates the archive file if it does not exist.

u   update files in the archive during a r (replace) operation. The files are added to the archive in exactly the same manner as replace except that an existing archive member will be retained (in its original position) if it has a modified more recently than the file being added. Note that this modifier acts as if a r operation has been specified (even it has not), and will actually override any other previously specified operation.

v   verbose; print additional diagnostic messages while processing the archive.

  Positional Modifiers
The following modifiers specify where in the archive files are moved to or added. If any of these modifiers are specified then the second option to ar86 must be the name of an archive member.

a   after; files are placed after the specified archive member.

b   before; files are placed before the specified archive member.

i   same as b.

EXAMPLES
To see the contents of an archive

    ar86 tv libfile.a

To add some files to an archive

    ar86 r libfile.a file1.o file2.o

to add some files after a member named mem.o and to update the symbol table

    ar86 rsa mem.o libfile.a file1.o file2.o

BUGS
A l modifier will be accepted but ignored.

RESTRICTIONS
This command is intended for use only with object files created using the Dev86/ELKS toolchain.

SEE ALSO
as86(1), bcc(1), ld86(1)

AUTHORS
© 1988, 1990 Free Software Foundation Inc. Changes for ar86 by Greg Haerr <greg@censoft.com>.

COPYRIGHT
The manual page was written for Debian GNU/Linux, © 2006 Shyamal Prasad <shyamal@member.fsf.org>. It is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2 (or any later version released by the Free Software Foundation).