title: Why atime is not preserved in tar?
body: <p>According to the <a href="http://linux.die.net/man/1/tar" rel="nofollow">documentation</a>, <code>tar</code> is capable of preserving the access time, but when I tried the same, it failed to do so. Can someone please explain this?</p>
  
  <pre><code>$$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; tar --version
  tar (GNU tar) 1.15.1
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Create two files with older timestamp</p>
  
  <pre><code>$$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; touch -t "201501010101" a.txt
  $$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; touch -t "201501010101" b.txt
  
  $$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; ls -ltu
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr 0 2015-01-01 01:01 a.txt
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr 0 2015-01-01 01:01 b.txt
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Move it to another folder</p>
  
  <pre><code>$$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; tar --atime-preserve -cvpf archive.tar *
  $$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; mv archive.tar ../target/
  $$$:~/user1/testtar/source&gt; cd ../target/
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Extract the tar</p>
  
  <pre><code>$$$:~/user1/testtar/target&gt; tar --atime-preserve -xvpf archive.tar
  a.txt
  b.txt
  
  $$$:~/user1/testtar/target&gt; ls -lt
  total 12
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr 10240 2016-07-07 15:55 archive.tar
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr     0 2015-01-01 01:01 a.txt
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr     0 2015-01-01 01:01 b.txt
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Result</p>
  
  <pre><code>$$$:~/user1/testtar/target&gt; ls -ltu
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr 10240 2016-07-07 15:56 archive.tar
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr     0 2016-07-07 15:56 a.txt
  -rw-r--r-- 1 usr usr     0 2016-07-07 15:56 b.txt
  </code></pre>