tar

# To extract an uncompressed archive:
tar -xvf /path/to/foo.tar

# To extract a .tar in specified directory:
tar -xvf /path/to/foo.tar -C /path/to/destination/

# To create an uncompressed archive:
tar -cvf /path/to/foo.tar /path/to/foo/

# To extract a .tgz or .tar.gz archive:
tar -xzvf /path/to/foo.tgz
tar -xzvf /path/to/foo.tar.gz

# To create a .tgz or .tar.gz archive:
tar -czvf /path/to/foo.tgz /path/to/foo/
tar -czvf /path/to/foo.tar.gz /path/to/foo/

# To list the content of an .tgz or .tar.gz archive:
tar -tzvf /path/to/foo.tgz
tar -tzvf /path/to/foo.tar.gz

# To extract a .tar.bz2 archive:
tar -xjvf /path/to/foo.tar.bz2

# To create a .tar.bz2 archive:
tar -cjvf /path/to/foo.tar.bz2 /path/to/foo/

# To list the content of an .tar.bz2 archive:
tar -tjvf /path/to/foo.tar.bz2

# To create a .tgz archive and exclude all jpg,gif,... from the tgz:
tar -czvf /path/to/foo.tgz --exclude=\*.{jpg,gif,png,wmv,flv,tar.gz,zip} /path/to/foo/

# To use parallel (multi-threaded) implementation of compression algorithms:
tar -z ... -> tar -Ipigz ...
tar -j ... -> tar -Ipbzip2 ...
tar -J ... -> tar -Ipixz ...

# To append a new file to an old tar archive:
tar -rf <archive.tar> <new-file-to-append>

# Exclude directory
tar --exclude='Documents/wc' --exclude='Documents/Myapps' -czvf /tmp/foo.tgz Documents/

# To create a .tgz archive and exclude all jpg,gif,... from the tgz:
tar -czvf /path/to/foo.tgz --exclude=\*.{jpg,gif,png,wmv,flv,tar.gz,zip} /path/to/foo/