Re: dumping to tape drive

[Jameson Burt <jameson@mnsinc.com>]

I too have an Exabyte 8200.  Mine works, so I mention what I do.
The primary line I use is
   /sbin/dump 0uBf 2500000 /dev/nst0   /
Notice the 0 for a whole dump, the B for size 2.5MB (2500000)
You merely needed to tell it how long your tape is,
otherwise the default is old-fashioned small.

If you have a Buslogic SCSI controller, it could be incompatible with
your Exabyte tape  -- search the debian-user archives for the last couple months,
or send me email (Exabyte has a firmware change you can make).
Both Buslogic and Exabyte are giving the Linux community some help,
Exabyte through their web page.



Here is part of a script I worked up, running it weekly as a cron job.

   log_file=/usr/local/backup/rabbit-log/rabbit_`/bin/date +%b-%d-%Y_%I:%M%p`
   touch $log_file      #This allows entries below to append $logfile, 
                        #so the first entry need not be unique.
   /bin/mt -f /dev/nst0 rewind
   
   # The total becomes greater than 2.5GB,
   # so I now backup "/mirror" on a separate tape.
   for filesystem in   \
                /  /usr  /var       \
                /home  /usr/local
   do
   if [ -z "$chunk" ];     then chunk=0;  
         else chunk=`expr $chunk + 1`; fi
      echo ' '               >>$log_file   2>&1
      echo ' '               >>$log_file   2>&1
      echo "---------- BACKING-UP ONTO TAPE-CHUNK \
         $chunk `hostname`:${filesystem} ----------" >>$log_file 2>&1
      # /sbin/dump 0uf /dev/nst0 $filesystem >>$log_file 2>&1
      /sbin/dump 0uBf 2500000 /dev/nst0 $filesystem >>$log_file 2>&1
   done

   /bin/mt -f /dev/nst0 offline   #So, you should insert a weekly backup-tape on Saturday.