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TX (Rust)

Two outputs, one CLI: TX archives with hash-verified backup redundancy + signing, or ISO images that carry their own index as the first track. No sidecars required.

Get Started Code Releases

WTF IS THIS? TX is a Rust-native pack/unpack tool with redundant backups, embedded ISO index, Ed25519 signing/trust (passphrase + ssh-agent supported), and TAR compatibility (tar xf *.tx works). This is a packing tool, not a compression tool (not yet).

Quickstart

Pack TX

Infer target from extension; primary + backup redundancy with hashes.

cargo run -p tx-cli -- pack /data backup.tx
cargo run -p tx-cli -- unpack backup.tx ./restore

Pack ISO

Index (index.idx) embedded and sorted first on disk.

cargo run -p tx-cli -- pack /data image.iso

Features

Resilience

Primary + redundancy, Merkle + hashes, trustable signatures.

  • Tar → zstd → shards (parity by default) or full backup, hashed & signed.
  • Tar-compatible: .tx starts with .tx/manifest.json as the first tar entry, then the payload and shards/backup; tar xf still works.
  • Optional Ed25519 signatures; trust-store enforcement.

ISO Path

Index-first images with manifest embedded.

  • Staging copy with index.idx + iso-manifest.json.
  • mkisofs/genisoimage/xorriso/xorrisofs places index first.
  • Mount directly; no sidecars.

Signing

Passphrase and ssh-agent friendly.

export TX_SIGN_KEY=~/.ssh/colossus
export TX_SIGN_PASSPHRASE='hunter42'   # if encrypted
export TX_SIGN_USE_AGENT=1            # prefer ssh-agent if loaded

Recovery Modes

Archive vs. file-aware repair.

  • Default parity: per-group shards (small files grouped, large files per group) → repair individual groups/files with ~25–30% overhead.
  • --duplicate: full backup blob (larger, simpler) → whole-archive recovery if primary is bad.
  • Plain tar fallback: tx unpack also extracts .tar/.tgz/.tbz2/.tzst when no TX metadata is present (no verification).

TX vs PAR2

How it differs.

  • TX is tar-compatible (tar xf *.tx works); PAR2 is a sidecar over files/tars.
  • TX stores manifest/hashes/signatures inside the archive; PAR2 does not sign.
  • TX parity defaults to per-group shards; PAR2 parity is per-file/chunk across multiple files.
  • TX is one artifact (metadata+data); PAR2 requires managing .par2 sets separately.

TX vs 7zip

Format & trust differences.

  • TX is tar-compatible (tar xf works); 7zip is its own container.
  • TX embeds manifest/hashes/signatures; 7zip has checksums but no signing.
  • TX has built-in parity; 7zip needs external parity.
  • TX is one artifact (metadata+data); 7zip often paired with sidecar parity.

Layout

Inside .tx

  • Front: uncompressed tar so tar xf works.
  • Metadata: .tx/manifest.json is the first entry (hashes, signatures, group map); tar users see it upfront.
  • Data: .tx/groups/<gid>/shard.N.bin (parity mode) or .tx/backup.tar.zst (duplicate mode).

Pipeline

TX Pack

walk → tar → zstd → hash/merkle → optional sign → write primary+backup.

ISO Pack

stage → index/manifest → mkisofs sorted so index is first track.

Unpack

verify manifest/signatures → validate hashes → fallback to backup → untar.

Platforms

Linux

Native and musl.

cargo build --release
CC_x86_64_unknown_linux_musl=musl-gcc \
  cargo build --release --target x86_64-unknown-linux-musl

Windows

MinGW toolchain required.

CC_x86_64_pc_windows_gnu=x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc \
  cargo build --release --target x86_64-pc-windows-gnu

macOS

Build on macOS or with Apple SDK/clang (osxcross).

cargo build --release --target x86_64-apple-darwin

Downloads

v0.0.5

Release Notes

Test Battery

Continuous loop with a 1s pause between suites so you can watch output.

./scripts/test.sh

Covers pack/unpack round-trip, backup failover, destructive corruptions, trust rejection (when a key is available), and CLI smoke.