deford@mizari.mitre.org (Kevin M. Deford) (06/05/91)
I am having an interesting problem with an Exabyte-8500. My dump happen automatically every night. The tape format has a 30MB blank file at the beginning of each tape followed by the dump structures. After the dumps have finished, I generate an index by getting a directory listing of each dump structure. I then write this index on the beginning of the tape (with a few other files) in the 30MB blank file. I have used this on 8200's for two years with no problem. I use a modified tar for the index write which rewinds the tape before closing which keeps the device driver from writing a second EOF. This approach does not work on the 8500's. I write a 30MB blank file, do the dumps without error and use the modified tar (or any other utility I have tried - regular tar, dd) and once the index is written, I cannot mt fsf over that file - get an IO error. Does anyone have a good reason for this? -- Kevin M. DeFord Internet: deford@linus.mitre.org; UUCP: {decvax,philabs}!linus!deford Office: 1A423, phone (617)271-3424 Mitre Corporation, Bedford, MA 01730