Debian bug report logs - #746 mt doesn't support setblk (and other options) Package: cpio ; Reported by: iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Ian Jackson); 210 days old . ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Message received at debian-bugs: From cus.cam.ac.uk!iwj10 Sat Jun 17 06:27:02 1995 Return-Path: Received: from pixar.com by mongo.pixar.com with smtp (Smail3.1.28.1 #15) id m0sMxtt-0007mPC; Sat, 17 Jun 95 06:27 PDT Received: from bootes.cus.cam.ac.uk by pixar.com with SMTP id AA25691 (5.67b/IDA-1.5 for debian-bugs-pipe@mongo.pixar.com); Sat, 17 Jun 1995 06:25:31 -0700 Received: by bootes.cus.cam.ac.uk (Smail-3.1.29.0 #36) id m0sMxtm-000BzuC; Sat, 17 Jun 95 14:26 BST Received: by chiark id (Debian /\oo/\ Smail3.1.29.1 #29.32); Sat, 17 Jun 95 13:29 BST Message-Id: Date: Sat, 17 Jun 95 13:29 BST From: iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Ian Jackson) To: Debian bugs submission address Subject: Re: Bug#746: mt doesn't support setblk (and other options) In-Reply-To: References: I complained that the version of `mt' we are distributing doesn't support `setblk' and various other options. I've just read the attached message in col.hardware. Clearly we should be distributing a different version of `mt'. Ian. Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.hardware Message-ID: <3q4fgr$sg@annex-1-slip-jik.cam.ov.com> References: <3q3mr6$hir@azure.acsu.buffalo.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: annex-1-slip-jik.cam.ov.com From: jik@annex-1-slip-jik.cam.ov.com (Jonathan Kamens) Subject: Re: 4mm DAT tape R/W on PC and SGI problem Date: 26 May 1995 11:54:03 GMT Your question is answered in the SCSI HOWTO. Go read it. In particular: Section 6.2.4 : Problems taking tapes to/from other systems. You can't read a tape made with another operating system or another operating system can't read a tape written in Linux. Different systems often use different block sizes. On a tape device using a fixed blocksize, you will get errors when reading blocks written using a different block size. To read these tapes, you must set the blocksize of the tape driver to match the blocksize used when the tape was written, or to variable. NOTE : this is the hardware block size, not the blocking factor used with tar, dump, etc. You can do this with the mt command - mt setblk or mt setblk 0 to get variable block length support. Note that these mt flags are NOT supported under the GNU version of mt which is included with some Linux distributions. Instead, you must use the BSD derrived Linux SCSI mt command. Source should be available from tsx-11.mit.edu:/pub/linux/ALPHA/scsi ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Acknowledgement sent to iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Ian Jackson) : Extra info received and forwarded. Full text available. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Information forwarded to debian-devel@pixar.com : Bug#746 ; Package cpio . Full text available. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Message received at debian-bugs: From cus.cam.ac.uk!iwj10 Tue Apr 4 12:45:35 1995 Return-Path: Received: from pixar.com by mongo.pixar.com with smtp (Smail3.1.28.1 #15) id m0rwEXe-0006EfC; Tue, 4 Apr 95 12:45 PDT Received: from bootes.cus.cam.ac.uk by pixar.com with SMTP id AA00875 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for ); Tue, 4 Apr 1995 12:43:30 -0700 Received: by bootes.cus.cam.ac.uk (Smail-3.1.29.0 #30) id m0rw96z-000C0wC; Tue, 4 Apr 95 14:57 BST Received: by chiark id m0rvz4k-0000YSZ (Debian /\oo/\ Smail3.1.29.1 #29.27); Tue, 4 Apr 95 04:14 BST Message-Id: Date: Tue, 4 Apr 95 04:14 BST From: iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Ian Jackson) To: Debian bugs submission address Subject: mt doesn't support setblk (and other options) Package: cpio Version: 2.3-2 Here is an edited unidiff between the manpage for setblk on my old installation and that from Debian 0.93R5 (+ indicates an option or meaning that's in Debian, - indicates an option or meaning that's in my old program). The manpage for each program appears to describe its behaviour reasonably accurately for the operations I have used; however, I rarely use `fsf' and similar operations. I need some of the missing options - in particular, I need setblk, and others may need setdensity. seek and tell would also be quite useful. BTW, the similarities in the wording suggest that at least the two manpages have a common origin. I have the source code for my `mt' program; it is from `tape-dist', which at one point came with the kernel SCSI tape driver. The README is dated November 1992. According to the README: The tape control program in this package is mt from the BSD NET2-release with the following additions: the commands erase, setblk, and setdensity have been added. setblk takes one argument which is the block size for the subsequent tape requests. ... I shall upload a tarfile (tape-dist-containing-mt.tar) to Incoming. Ian. weof + eof Write count EOF marks at current position. fsf Forward space count files. The tape is positioned on the first block of the next file. - fsfm Forward space count files. The tape is positioned - on the last block of the previous file. bsf Backward space count files. The tape is positioned + on the first block of the next file. - on the last block of the previous file. - bsfm Backward space count files. The tape is positioned - on the first block of the next file. + bsfm Backward space count file marks. The tape is posi- + tioned on the beginning-of-the-tape side of the + file mark. + asf Absolute space to file number count. Equivalent to + rewind followed by fsf count. + eom Space to the end of the recorded media on the tape + (for appending files onto tapes). - eod, seod - Space to end of valid data. Used on streamer tape - drives to append data to the logical and of tape. - setblk Set the block size of the drive to count bytes per - record. - setdensity - Set the tape density code to count. The proper - codes to use with each drive should be looked up - from the drive documentation. - - seek Seek to the count block on the tape. This opera- - tion is available on some Tandberg and Wangtek - streamers and some SCSI-2 tape drives. - - tell Tell the current block on tape. This operation is - available on some Tandberg and Wangtek streamers - and some SCSI-2 tape drives. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Acknowledgement sent to iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Ian Jackson) : New bug report received and forwarded. Full text available. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Report forwarded to debian-devel@pixar.com : Bug#746 ; Package cpio . Full text available. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Ian Jackson / iwj10@thor.cam.ac.uk , with the debian-bugs tracking mechanism This page last modified 07:43:01 GMT Wed 01 Nov