Re: (clug-talk) IBM Library Question.

[Kevin Anderson]

I'll be using tar if at all possible.  It's easy to find support in case I get smoked by a bus.  And tar is more or less platform independant, so it would be fairly easy to restore in case something REALLY bad did ever happen.  I suppose, I also like tar.  Combining it with cron, I can create a really easy to maintain backup solution for next to nothing.  And I like that it's really simplistic, because that means that there's next to nothing to go wrong.   What I found is that IBM has drivers for the library for RH & Suse.  From my initial skimming, it actually sounds like you DL the source, and compile, so there's a pretty good chance they'll work anywhere.   The driver creates 3 devices.  One for the tape drive (I assume that since this has 2 tape drives, it'll have 2 valid devices.  One for the autoloader, and one for the library itself.   Now again, I only skimmed the docs, but from what I found, I can have everything I need done by passing various calls to each of these 3 devices.  The only thing I didn't overly investigate (remember, I'm 4 months away from using it), is how it keeps track of which tape is which in the library.   Ultimately, even if it can't, That's ok, I don't mind changing them every day.   Kev.     ----- Original Message ----- From: Ian Bruseker To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 1:03 PM Subject: RE: (clug-talk) IBM Library Question. I'm curious, Kevin, what did you find?  I'd be interested to know specifically what you find out in terms of backup software (I will be facing the same question soon myself, though the tape drive I got is not a library type - it's single tape only).   Ian   -----Original Message----- From: Kevin Anderson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 12:52 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: (clug-talk) IBM Library Question. I should have STFWed a but further.   I found it, I think...   Any suggestions would still be greatly appreciated.   Kev.       ----- Original Message ----- From: Kevin Anderson To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 11:06 AM Subject: (clug-talk) IBM Library Question. I've had an IBM 3583 Tape Library more or less fall to me.   It's a slick little unit, which can shuffle it's own tapes, and stuff.  But I suspect it'll take more than a tar command to make it work.   Does anyone have any experience with tape autoloaders, or alternately, can anyone point me in the direction of a support site where I might be able to find some instructions on how to accomplish this?   I'll end up needing a fairly short list of things.   I need to get tapes entered into the Library (Scan the Barcode, and keep track of where everything is.) I need to move a tape from in the Library to one of the Tape Drives (By barcode) I need to move data onto the tape (TAR?) I need to get the tape out of the drive, and back to the library. Lastly, I need to be able to eject the tapes from the library.   Kev.