Streaming asynchronous non-blocking tar using Python and asyncio

streaming_tar.py

import os.path
import aiohttp.web

async def get_tar(request):
	'''
	AIOHTTP server handler for GET request that wants to download files from a `directory` using TAR.
	'''
	directory = <specify the directory>

	response = aiohttp.web.StreamResponse(
		status=200,
		reason='OK',
		headers={
			'Content-Type': 'application/x-tar',
			'Content-Disposition': 'attachment; filename="archive.tar"',
		},
	)
	await response.prepare(request)

	# Iterate over directory and stream found files
	for root, dirs, files in os.walk(directory):
		for file in files:
			file_path = os.path.join(root, file)
			await stream_tar(response, file_path)

	# Write two 512-byte blocks of zeros at the end of the archive
	await response.write(b'\x00' * 1024)
	await response.write_eof()

	return response


async def stream_tar(response, file_path):
	# Create a TarInfo object for each file and stream it with the file's content
	file_name = os.path.basename(file_path)
	file_size = os.path.getsize(file_path)

	# Create a TarInfo object
	info = tarfile.TarInfo(name=file_name)
	info.size = file_size
	info.mtime = os.path.getmtime(file_path)
	info.mode = 0o640
	info.type = tarfile.REGTYPE
	
	# Write the tar header
	header_bytes = info.tobuf(format=tarfile.USTAR_FORMAT)
	await response.write(header_bytes)

	# Stream the file content
	with open(file_path, 'rb') as f:
		while True:
			chunk = f.read(8192)
			if not chunk:
				break
			await response.write(chunk)

	# Pad to full 512-byte blocks if needed
	if file_size % 512 != 0:
		await response.write(b'\x00' * (512 - (file_size % 512)))