3 May
2002
3 May
'02
2:10 a.m.
Date: Thu, 2 May 2002 02:01:33 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ethan Dicks <erd_6502(a)yahoo.com>
Subject: Tape dumping programs for Unix/Linux...
To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org
Sender: owner-classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org
Reply-To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org
So I finally got this TSZ07 that I've been wanting for a while so I can
archive a mountain of magtape I have (including System III sources for
the 11/780, on up to distro tapes of the 1990s). I can use dd to slurp
stuff off of tape, but it's tedious. What tools are people using for
tape archiving under Linux or Solaris? AIX seems to come with "tcopy"
that essentially pulls everything off the tape until logical or physical
EOT. I'm looking for something similar - point it at the drive and
siphon it on down.
Look for a program named "copytape". It copies tapes including the
block structure, file marks, etc. Unlike dd(1) which only really
works if all blocks are the same size and there is only one file
on the tape. It can copy tape-drive to tape-drive or tape-drive to
disk file, and puts markers in the disk file to indicate the
structure of the data on the tape.
Copytape is a "classic" piece of software, its source file begins as follows:
/*
* COPYTAPE.C
*
* This program duplicates magnetic tapes, preserving the
* blocking structure and placement of tape marks.
*
* This program was updated at
*
* U.S. Army Artificial Intelligence Center
* HQDA (Attn: DACS-DMA)
* Pentagon
* Washington, DC 20310-0200
*
* Phone: (202) 694-6900
*
**************************************************
*
* THIS PROGRAM IS IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
*
**************************************************
*
* July 1986 David S. Hayes
* Made data file format human-readable.
It should be available at numerous FTP sites.
carl
--
carl lowenstein marine physical lab u.c. san diego
clowenstein(a)ucsd.edu