When loading an OS to a guest, I see an option where we can add a virtual DVD. However, if I have an ignite tape from a source host that I want to virualize, I would like to virtualize the tape drive on the VM Host so I could do an ignite recovery from tape of the source server. We don't have an ignite network depot.
Can you create a virtual tape device on a guest as we do for a DVD? I know the ignite process on HP-UX Integrity starts with a boot of the DVD, then one goes to the tape device for the ignite restore.
Tape devices are generally not shareable, at least in the base OS.
For systems without tape drivers, instead of using make_tape_recovery to backup, we use make_net_recovery to make ignite backups. In essence, this uses an NFS mountpoint maintained by an Ignite server as a tape device.
SEP
Steven E Protter Owner of ISN Corporation http://isnamerica.com http://hpuxconsulting.com Sponsor: http://hpux.ws Twitter: http://twitter.com/hpuxlinux Founder http://newdatacloud.com
It is not possible to virtualize tape drive on the VM host. The only provided options called "Virtulised storage devices" are Disks and DVDs,Logical volumes,Locally mounted files. Refer the following doc at http://docs.hp.com/en/T2767-90004/ch02s02.html#virtual_storage
For your info, the latest Ignite-UX version C.6.8 does support now the direct bootup from tape drive on Integrity machines (not IVMs) with required/compliant firmware.
Maybe we might see an option of tape drive as virtualised storage device in IVMs in future.
