tlug: Ftape

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <turnbull@example.com>]

>>>>> "wile y" == Christopher Sekiya <wileyc@example.com> writes:

    >> The first one made an entry in fstab of: /dev/ftape /mnt/tape
    >> auto,user,exec,dev,suid,rw 1 1
    >> 
    >> The second made an entry in fstab of: /dev/tape /mnt/tape
    >> auto,exec,dev,suid,rw 1 1

    wile y> Ftape isn't a block device, it's a character device.

    wile y> One doesn't mount ftape -- one treats it like a tape
    wile y> device ;)

Well, there was some noise about making it mountable at one point, but 
it sure seems silly.  (I think the idea was that you could use a
directory to locate multiple archives on the tape, but it would
involve a lot of rewinding.)

I did use ftape a long time ago, and the basic tools were mt (which
controls the magnetic tape, you can skip blocks or files, rewind, fast
forward, erase, add marks, etc) and tar.  You could also use cpio I
guess, and maybe even DD.

I didn't use mt very much, tapes were cheap enough that I just did

tar --create --verbose --use-compress-program=gzip \
    --file=/dev/ftape /path/to/source/directory

and

tar --extract --verbose --use-compress-program=gzip \
    --file=/dev/ftape

Note that the char special device itself, not some mounted point, is
used.

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