General :: Can't Make Clear On Most Manpages - Can't Simply Usebzip2 File?

What they don't make clear on most manpages is that you can't simply usebzip2 thisfile.xxx that gives bzip2 free rein to include the original extension in the filename. You must use the -c tag (and better than that, the -c and -k tags, the latter of which leaves the original file untouched post-compression), then -if you wish- the level of compression to apply to a file (in the range of 1-9, with 1 being next-to-no compression and 9 the highest level of compression), followed by the filename/s to compress, then after a single space, a right-hand carat (">"), then another single space and the name you want to give the compressed bzip2 file, remembering to add the extension ".bzip2" (no quotes) to your filename.

Sounds pretty obvious, doesn't it? Well, I thought so too once I read a particular manual page and reasoned it out. Then I remembered the 15 or so minutes it took me to Google myself to that manpage, and I decided it was good Net citizenship to put up a little step-by-step like this one on an appropriate forum on which I was already a registered member.

It isn't just the C++ heads or the Python jockeys who need things broken down to their simplest bits for them from time to time. Newbies and near-newbies do, too. I took it as read that was the reason for this subforum, so here I went.