On Wednesday, 07/23/2008 at 11:47 EDT, Rob van der Heij <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> But Sir Mike! The modern 3480 cartridge does not do shiny bits > anymore. After all, the cartridge is closed so there is no light that > will go in to shine ;-) The control unit is smart enough to count the > operations that move the tape, and indeed... virtualizes BOT. The drive doesn't have to count operations. The drive knows where BOT and EOT are at all times because of block numbers and other information encoded on the servo track. (The presence of the servo track is why you must not degauss a cartridge tape.) Alan Altmark z/VM Development IBM Endicott
