I guess you only ever extract punctually named files. But it's still rather amusing that with the exception of 'case', the only places where $1 is properly quot

I guess you only ever extract punctually named files. But it's still rather amusing that with the exception of 'case', the only places where $1 is properly quoted are the ones where it's not really necessary, and vice versa (but then again, it's not done for the parameter, but rather the single quotes). Anyway, my advice to you and anyone else having trouble with tar is that "tar caf" and "tar xaf" are the only things most people need to remember about tar, with or without compression. (In this case, most people means people who use tar, but so rarely that they have trouble remembering how to use it; they probably never use it for anything else other than (un)archiving. Also, xkcd isn't gospel.)