Re: [SLUG] Inexpensive Tape Drive

From: Bill Ehlert (Ehlerts@SoftHome.net)
Date: Fri Aug 31 2001 - 12:08:57 EDT


Paul,

So good to hear you are into scripts and backups. I have fun and like 'em
too.

First, I want to send an enormous "Thank You!" to Paul Foster, our SLUG
fearless leader and cub reporter wannabe (great job on the Linux picnic
scoop). Paul is doing an outstanding job for SLUG and deserves an award or
at least 101 atta boys.

Second, awhile back, Paul posted a problem about getting errors while
transferring files between computers using floppy diskettes. I hope Paul was
able to resolve the problem, but now these backup postings got me to
thinking about what may have happened. A long time ago, I used floppies to
backup files. Yep, I'm old, sometimes I feel like Yoda. Don't know if the
rest of you youngsters remember when AOL used to distribute their software
on floppies, but I would collect them and use them for backup and file
transfers. Paul, come on, 'fess up, were you using old AOL floppies too? :-)

Third, sorry about this post Paul, but things have been going too smoothly
for you, and somebody has to rattle the cage once in a while. My wife, AKA,
Yaddle has made it her life-long task to rattle my cage with every
opportunity she gets :-(

Finally, a Linux question. I'd like to ask if anyone out there knows how to
stop an MP3 sound file from playing once started from Red Hat 7.1 GNOME gmc.
I double click the MP3 file name and it plays, but I don't see the player or
controls to stop the music. Any suggestions?

Bill

From: "Paul M Foster" <paulf@quillandmouse.com>

On Thu, Aug 30, 2001 at 01:55:54PM -0400, Robert Haeckl wrote:

<snip>

> Actually, the intent is to have fun learning to use 'dump' and 'restore'
> to a tape device.

<snip>

> By the way, has anybody tried using the floppy as a nonrewind tape
> device, just for the fun of it? Can you use the 'mt' command on it?

I don't think the fd* devices are set up to be used this way. I do use
floppy-interface _tapes_ (Travan) for my systems.

Re: dump and restore, I don't know precisely how dump and restore work
(bit-by-bit copy?). However, I'd caution against doing tar backups, even
though that's what tar (Tape ARchive) was originally for. If something
goes bad in the middle of a tar archive (as happens with tapes) the rest
of the archive is garbage. Better to use cpio or afio. Doing it this
way, each file is individual copied to the backup medium and if one goes
bad, at least the rest of the files might still be good.

I favor a little script called tob (Tape Oriented Backup). You can
select the type of archiving done (tar, cpio, afio), and compress the
files as they are backed up. So you get a thousand gzipped files on your
tape, each individually copied. Interface is simple, as in:

tob -full allfiles

I use this at home and at the office.

Paul
(P.S. Did I mention I don't like GUIs? ;-)



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