Re: Rewind before ejecting?
On Thu, Sep 25, 2003 at 11:57:35AM -0400, M3 Freak wrote: Hello, I have what may seem like a silly questions, but let me assure you, I have absolutely no idea how tape backups work. I've only just figured out why my RH9 system wasn't seeing the tape drive. Configuring amanda and administering it is a whole different thing! Anyway, my question is basic. Last night I manually ran amdump, and it completed successfully. I read the email amanda sent me, and it's now waiting for a new tape. I know that I have to put in the new tape, label it, and then set up cron to run automatically tonight. However, before I put in the new tape, should I just issue an eject command to the drive to spit the tape out, or do I have to rewind it before ejecting it? I haven't used a tape backup system before, so I don't know what the consequences are of rewinding tapes or not before ejecting them. I would very much appreciate suggestions/advice on this. To my relatively limited knowledge, drives rewind the tape before ejecting. OTOH I don't generally count on that and rewind myself first. -- Jon H. LaBadie [EMAIL PROTECTED] JG Computing 4455 Province Line Road(609) 252-0159 Princeton, NJ 08540-4322 (609) 683-7220 (fax)
Re: Rewind before ejecting?
On Thu, Sep 25, 2003 at 11:57:35AM -0400, M3 Freak wrote: [...] should I just issue an eject command to the drive to spit the tape out, or do I have to rewind it before ejecting it? It depends on the tape technology, I think. DAT tapes rewind on their own. Some other kinds might not (though I don't really know). What kind of tape drive do you have? -- | | /\ |-_|/ Eric Siegerman, Toronto, Ont.[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | / When I came back around from the dark side, there in front of me would be the landing area where the crew was, and the Earth, all in the view of my window. I couldn't help but think that there in front of me was all of humanity, except me. - Michael Collins, Apollo 11 Command Module Pilot
Re: Rewind before ejecting?
At 11:57 AM 9/25/2003 -0400, M3 Freak wrote: Hello, I have what may seem like a silly questions, but let me assure you, I have absolutely no idea how tape backups work. I've only just figured out why my RH9 system wasn't seeing the tape drive. Configuring amanda and administering it is a whole different thing! Anyway, my question is basic. Last night I manually ran amdump, and it completed successfully. I read the email amanda sent me, and it's now waiting for a new tape. I know that I have to put in the new tape, label it, and then set up cron to run automatically tonight. However, before I put in the new tape, should I just issue an eject command to the drive to spit the tape out, or do I have to rewind it before ejecting it? I haven't used a tape backup system before, so I don't know what the consequences are of rewinding tapes or not before ejecting them. I would very much appreciate suggestions/advice on this. Thanks in advance. Regards, Kanwar All tapes drives that I know of will rewind the tape if you merely issue an eject or offline command. Only an audio cassette unit (ok, or a VCR) will ever hand you a tape in a half-way state. So . commanding rewind and then eject is redundant. But certainly not harmful! Deb Baddorf --- Deb Baddorf [EMAIL PROTECTED] 840-2289 Nobody told me that living happily ever after would be such hard work ... S. WhiteIXOYE
Re: Rewind before ejecting?
Some tape drives must be taken off line before they will eject. my adic fastor4000 is on like that. every time I eject manually I have to issue the command /bin/mt -f /dev/st0 rewoffl (rewind and take off line). some drives don't need thins and can just be given the eject command. good luck, chrisj M3 Freak wrote: Hello, I have what may seem like a silly questions, but let me assure you, I have absolutely no idea how tape backups work. I've only just figured out why my RH9 system wasn't seeing the tape drive. Configuring amanda and administering it is a whole different thing! Anyway, my question is basic. Last night I manually ran amdump, and it completed successfully. I read the email amanda sent me, and it's now waiting for a new tape. I know that I have to put in the new tape, label it, and then set up cron to run automatically tonight. However, before I put in the new tape, should I just issue an eject command to the drive to spit the tape out, or do I have to rewind it before ejecting it? I haven't used a tape backup system before, so I don't know what the consequences are of rewinding tapes or not before ejecting them. I would very much appreciate suggestions/advice on this. Thanks in advance. Regards, Kanwar
