Hello, I am using CPIO (with optional GZ) for its useful feature that the trailer can be cut off, and the archives can simply be concatenated. That is useful for Linux initial ramdisks, but also for the build system I am working on.
I have been kludging this into code like this, which happens to work on Debian but not when I rebuilt CPIO on OpenWRT: https://github.com/arpa2/mkhere/blob/fd41733a0e2daeb93ee088846f78255c92f5efff/lib/stdlib#L79-L82 Ideally, I would use a --no-trailer option to CPIO instead of doing https://github.com/arpa2/mkhere/blob/fd41733a0e2daeb93ee088846f78255c92f5efff/lib/stdlib#L168-L171 In "cpio -o", --no-trailer would avoid appending the TRAILER. In "cpio -i", --no-trailer wouldn't mind the missing TRAILER but likely check the proper finishing point. Interestingly, when GZIP is applied to the CPIO parts, it could be used to append .CPIO.GZ files made with --no-trailer too! And that pattern is also useful for Linux' initial ramdisks. (You cannot mix GZIP with non-GZIP though.) Would you agree that this adds value to GNU CPIO? Thanks, -Rick P.S. I'll be off on holiday on 3-13 januari, so then I will be slow.
