[comp.unix.questions] GNU tar

jimb@faatcrl.UUCP (Jim Burwell) (10/19/89)

Hi there!

Has anyone gotten GNU tar's multivolume option working on a 1/4" SCSI tape
drive ?  I'm trying to use this option on a Sun 3/160..  It seems like it
doesn't know when it hits the end of the tape, and mistakes it for an IO error.
I'd like to know if anyone has a fix for this, before I start hacking :-).

Bye
Jim
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|          James S. Burwell                      |                          |
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wbader@scarecrow.mse.lehigh.edu (William Bader) (10/20/89)

In article <1051@faatcrl.UUCP> jimb@faatcrl.UUCP (Jim Burwell) writes:
 
>   Has anyone gotten GNU tar's multivolume option working on a 1/4" SCSI tape
>   drive ?  I'm trying to use this option on a Sun 3/160..  It seems like it
>   doesn't know when it hits the end of the tape, and mistakes it for an IO error.
>   I'd like to know if anyone has a fix for this, before I start hacking :-).

I have a version of pdtar that I modified to read a /etc/default/tar file
like the tar on Xenix.  It can get the volume size from the file to make
multi-volume archives.

idall@augean.OZ (Ian Dall) (10/23/89)

In article <1051@faatcrl.UUCP> jimb@faatcrl.UUCP (Jim Burwell) writes:
>Hi there!
>
>Has anyone gotten GNU tar's multivolume option working on a 1/4" SCSI tape
>drive ?  I'm trying to use this option on a Sun 3/160..  It seems like it
>doesn't know when it hits the end of the tape, and mistakes it for an IO error.
>I'd like to know if anyone has a fix for this, before I start hacking :-).

Well, I haven't used GNU tar, but last time I looked the SUN 1/4 in
tape drivers are pretty broken w.r.t. EOM (end of media). IMHO I think
a tape driver write should fail with ENOSPC when an attempt is made to
write past the end of tape. The SunOs 3 and SunOs 4 drivers I tried
just hung. Perhaps GNU tar relies on the error type?
-- 
 Ian Dall           life (n). A sexually transmitted disease which afflicts
                              some people more severely than others.
idall@augean.oz