Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
In a message dated: Mon, 03 Jan 2005 16:49:47 EST Jon LaBadie said: As an alternative, couldn't you change the human aspect of the problem? Sure, and that was my fall back plan in case a techical solution wasn't feasible. But I felt it was at least worth asking about :) Thanks! -- Seeya, Paul GPG Key fingerprint = 1660 FECC 5D21 D286 F853 E808 BB07 9239 53F1 28EE If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right!
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
In a message dated: Tue, 04 Jan 2005 09:17:19 +0100 Gerhard den Hollander said: 2) even easier and cheaper when you store the tape, in the tape box (and on the tape and on the paper insert that comes with the tape) simply write that this set only has one tape. This is what my fall back plan was :) Thanks, -- Seeya, Paul GPG Key fingerprint = 1660 FECC 5D21 D286 F853 E808 BB07 9239 53F1 28EE If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right!
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
In a message dated: Mon, 03 Jan 2005 17:03:47 +0100 Gerhard den Hollander said: * [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mon, Jan 03, 2005 at 10:3 6:51AM -0500) Is there an easy way to change the amanda label of a tape that's been written to? Short of that, is there an easy way to recover the contents of the tape in amdump form, then re-label the tape and use amflush to get the contents on the newly/properly labelled tape? yes there is, but why would you want to do that ? Amanda will still think that tape with the old (now overwritten ) label is the one that has the data on it. so if you relabel the tape, amanda doesn;t know anything about it anymore at all .. I mis-labelled a tape. This tape is never really used in a sequence, it's strictly an archival tape that gets put in off-site storage indefinitely. I want to remove the tape entirely from amanda's knowledge. If I could just change the label name, and somehow update amanda's database, that would be fine. I suspect, however, that it's easier to just restore the tape to disk and flush to the next new tape and amrmtape the mislabelled one. But I'm not sure how to restore the tape to chunks that amflush will recognize. -- Seeya, Paul GPG Key fingerprint = 1660 FECC 5D21 D286 F853 E808 BB07 9239 53F1 28EE If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right!
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
On Monday 03 January 2005 11:50, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a message dated: Mon, 03 Jan 2005 17:03:47 +0100 Gerhard den Hollander said: * [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mon, Jan 03, 2005 at 10:3 6:51AM -0500) Is there an easy way to change the amanda label of a tape that's been written to? Short of that, is there an easy way to recover the contents of the tape in amdump form, then re-label the tape and use amflush to get the contents on the newly/properly labelled tape? yes there is, but why would you want to do that ? Amanda will still think that tape with the old (now overwritten ) label is the one that has the data on it. so if you relabel the tape, amanda doesn;t know anything about it anymore at all .. I mis-labelled a tape. This tape is never really used in a sequence, it's strictly an archival tape that gets put in off-site storage indefinitely. I want to remove the tape entirely from amanda's knowledge. Relabeling the tape will destroy all of amandas knowledge of whats on that tape. What you want to do I'd think, is to mark it 'no-reuse' in amanda's database. That will not destroy the info, and the tape could then be brought back onsite and read quite some time later. Amanda will then skip over that label and use the next one in the order in which they were labeled sequence. The only one the least bit upset by this might be you because your very carefully labeled tape for Tuesday will now be used on Monday, and amanda won't let you make another Tuesday tape. It seems like everybody has to try it at least once though. :-) Most of us just enumerate the number on the label and ignore the day of the week. Its far less headache in the long run to just let amanda handle it as amanda is quite competant to do so. If I could just change the label name, and somehow update amanda's database, that would be fine. I suspect, however, that it's easier to just restore the tape to disk and flush to the next new tape and amrmtape the mislabelled one. But I'm not sure how to restore the tape to chunks that amflush will recognize. -- Cheers, Gene There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order. -Ed Howdershelt (Author) 99.31% setiathome rank, not too shabby for a WV hillbilly Yahoo.com attorneys please note, additions to this message by Gene Heskett are: Copyright 2004 by Maurice Eugene Heskett, all rights reserved.
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
On Mon, Jan 03, 2005 at 10:36:51AM -0500, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi all, Is there an easy way to change the amanda label of a tape that's been written to? Short of that, is there an easy way to recover the contents of the tape in amdump form, then re-label the tape and use amflush to get the contents on the newly/properly labelled tape? Quick answer is sure, just overwrite the 32KB first file on the tape. Longer answer dependes on what you want to do with the tape and how much you expect amanda to remember about the tape, its contents, and its new label. To overwrite it, do a dd if=tapedevice of=sometmpname bs=32k. Maybe make a copy of sometmpname so if you mess up you can restore it. Next edit the file sometmpname to change the tape name. Then rewind the tape and do the same dd command with 'if' and 'of' reversed. Note, after doing this amanda has an invalid concept of what is on the tape. It still thinks the other tape exists and has valid contents. Depending on what new tape name you choose, the modified tape is either not known by amanda's index (a new tape name) or does not match the index's listing of the contents. So depending on what you plan to do with the modified tape this is may or may not be a reasonable thing to do. If you don't need to use the index (i.e. use amrestore and not amrecover) then fine, modify it and amrmtape the original name. Otherwise a different action may be the wisest choice. jl -- Jon H. LaBadie [EMAIL PROTECTED] JG Computing 4455 Province Line Road(609) 252-0159 Princeton, NJ 08540-4322 (609) 683-7220 (fax)
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
In a message dated: Mon, 03 Jan 2005 13:14:02 EST Jon LaBadie said: Quick answer is sure, just overwrite the 32KB first file on the tape. Longer answer dependes on what you want to do with the tape and how much you expect amanda to remember about the tape, its contents, and its new label. To overwrite it, do a dd if=tapedevice of=sometmpname bs=32k. Maybe make a copy of sometmpname so if you mess up you can restore it. Next edit the file sometmpname to change the tape name. Then rewind the tape and do the same dd command with 'if' and 'of' reversed. Note, after doing this amanda has an invalid concept of what is on the tape. It still thinks the other tape exists and has valid contents. Depending on what new tape name you choose, the modified tape is either not known by amanda's index (a new tape name) or does not match the index's listing of the contents. Hmm, okay. Ideally I'd like amanda's knowledge of what's on the tape to change with the tape label. This is the problem: I have a configuration called 'archive', the sole purpose of which is be stored off site indefinitely. There a no-reuse policy on these tapes. The tape labels are of the form '-Q[1-4]-Tape-X/Y' This way, I need only know from which quarter I need to restore from should I ever need to pull one of these tapes from storage. Last week I ran this configuration and labelled the tape as 1/2, but we only used 1 tape, not 2. What want to accomplish is changing this tape to be 1/1 instead of 1/2. So, I can either edit the tape header and the amanda database, or dump the tape to disk, then flush it to a new tape, which actually sounds easier. So, how would I extract the contents of a tape so I could flush it to another tape? -- Seeya, Paul GPG Key fingerprint = 1660 FECC 5D21 D286 F853 E808 BB07 9239 53F1 28EE If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right!
Re: re-labelling or duplicating a tape?
On Mon, Jan 03, 2005 at 03:28:03PM -0500, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In a message dated: Mon, 03 Jan 2005 13:14:02 EST Jon LaBadie said: Quick answer is sure, just overwrite the 32KB first file on the tape. Longer answer dependes on what you want to do with the tape and how much you expect amanda to remember about the tape, its contents, and its new label. ... Hmm, okay. Ideally I'd like amanda's knowledge of what's on the tape to change with the tape label. This is the problem: I have a configuration called 'archive', the sole purpose of which is be stored off site indefinitely. There a no-reuse policy on these tapes. The tape labels are of the form '-Q[1-4]-Tape-X/Y' This way, I need only know from which quarter I need to restore from should I ever need to pull one of these tapes from storage. Last week I ran this configuration and labelled the tape as 1/2, but we only used 1 tape, not 2. What want to accomplish is changing this tape to be 1/1 instead of 1/2. So, I can either edit the tape header and the amanda database, or dump the tape to disk, then flush it to a new tape, which actually sounds easier. So, how would I extract the contents of a tape so I could flush it to another tape? I know of no way to accomplish what you are looking to do. Doesn't mean it can't be done, I just don't know of any and I can see lots of potential problems trying to accomplish it. Perhaps for a future version of amanda someone could write a routine to import a tape(s) into the index and tapelist. Anyone anxious to do some coding for the amanda project :) As an alternative, couldn't you change the human aspect of the problem? Amanda is quite happy with things the way they are. It has a label, has written data to a tape of that label, has an index of the contents, doesn't know (or care) that you expected to need two tapes. There might be an extra tape labeled ...2/2, but that can be rmlabel'ed and relabeled. Seems the only one with problems is the humans involved. Couldn't they find a way to note that the second tape was not used for this archive? Maybe even an empty tape box or slot with a note in it? Just my one fiftyith of a dollar. jl -- Jon H. LaBadie [EMAIL PROTECTED] JG Computing 4455 Province Line Road(609) 252-0159 Princeton, NJ 08540-4322 (609) 683-7220 (fax)
