You can use the following commands to manage your compressed files on any Linux Debian distribution:

• The following creates file.tar, containing files:

tar cf [file.tar] [files]

• The following extracts files from a tar, file.tar:

tar xf  [file.tar]

• The following creates a tar with Gzip compression:

tar czf [file.tar.gz] [files]

• The following extracts a tar using Gzip:

tar xzf [file.tar.gz]

• The following creates a tar with bzip2 compression:

tar cjf [file.tar.bz2]

• The following extracts a bzip2 compressed file:

tar xjf [file.tar.bz2]

• The following compresses a file (or files) using gzip compression:

gzip [files]

• The following decompresses a compressed gz file:

gzip -d [file.gz]

• The following unzips a ZIP file:

unzip [file.zip]