How do i list the contents of a tar file

Question

I tried using -t like the man says, but it just waits.

Example

$ tar -t archive.tar 
 (nothing)

Answer 1

I needed to add the f flag to tell tar I'm specifying the filename, i.e.

$ tar -tf archive.tar
file1.txt
file2.txt
$

Answer 2

You can also increase the number of details listed:

$ tar -tvf archive.tar
-rw-r--r--  0 user group       0  3 Dez 00:21 file1.txt
-rw-r--r--  0 user group       0  3 Dez 00:21 file2.txt

While the -x switch is usually used to extract the whole content of an archive, you can also use it to extract a single file or directory:

$ tar -xvf test.tar file1.txt
x file1.txt

Best wishes, Fabian