Tar and feather
<jargon> (A sick contrivance from the Unix tar command and the Ku Klux Klan torture method) To create a transportable archive from a group of files by first sticking them together with tar (the Tape ARchiver) and then compressing the result.
The latter action is dubbed "feathering" (purely for contrived effect) by analogy to what you do with an aeroplane propeller to decrease wind resistance, or with an oar to reduce water resistance; smaller files, after all, slip through comm links more easily.
[Jargon File]
| < Previous Terms | Terms Containing tar and feather | Next Terms > |
| tape drive tape head Tape Operating System TAPI tar | tar zip | tarball targa Targa Graphics Adaptor target Target-Machine Description Language |
