fbackup and /dev/rmt/2m

[Luc Monnens]

Dear hp-ux sys admin gurus,

I have a problem with fbackup and /dev/rmt/2m.

I have an L3000 - running hp-ux 11.00 - with an Ultrium 2-SCSI tape drive on which I would like to set up an automated backup.
I used sam to set this up and sam sees the tape drive on hardware path 0/0/1/0.1.0 and allows me to set up the backup job in cron.

When it executes fbackup exits with code 2 and the error message "The output file /dev/rmt/2m is not a valid device file for backup".

I checked the forums and found to do a "ioscan -fnC tape" and a "insf -knfC tape".
I did the ioscan and it finds the tape drive with among others the /dev/rmt/2m device file.
I did not do the insf because its man page warns to run in Single user mode and that is currently not possible.

I did a "tar cvf /dev/rmt/2m /home" and it completes successfully + the tar tvf /dev/rmt/2m shows all the files from /home backed up to tape.

1. What is wrong?
2. How do I fix it?

Any input that helps solve this, is much appreciated.

Kind regards,

Luc monnens

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom,

You may wish to try a different device.

If not present the tape drive may be dead.

You may wish to try reunumber instances. Its risky and a PITA but it may work.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=1046790

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=960754

SEP

[melvyn burnard]

What model of device is it exactly?
You may need to patch fbackup/frecover to handle newer devices.

Also be aware, HP-UX 11.00 goes out of support 31st December 2006

[Luc Monnens]

Thank you both for your swift replies.

Hi Steve,

Since tar works the tape drive is not dead, is it?
I would prefer not to renumber instances if I can help it.

Hi Melvin,

Where/How do I find the model of the device?
Where do I find if I need fbackup patches for this device?

Yes I know about the 11.00 support issue.
This server will be upgrade to 11.11 before year end. Thanks for reminding me though.

Kind regards,

Luc

[melvyn burnard]

What does the label say on the device? What does ioscan report it as?
Use swlist to see what current fbackup patch you may have installed, or go look on the ITRC patch pages to look for an fbackup patch for 11.00

[Yang Qin_1]

Can you check if you have PHCO_33201 (or PHCO_23854, PHCO_29197) installed? If you have this patch installed then try to run /usr/sbin/fbackup -i /home -f /dev/rmt/2m manually. You'd better run a "mt -t /dev/rmt/2m rew" before fbackup to make sure tape is properly loaded and rewined to the begining.

Yang

[Bill Hassell · Accepted solution]

fbackup is failing because it does not know anything about this tape model. The command:

ioscan -kfC tape

will identify the tape model. The Ultrium tape drive is quite new and you need to patch fbackup to understand the special commands needed to fully control the device. Unlike simple tools like tar, fbackup performs a number of internal commands unique to each tape drive. The drive device file (2m) is just fine since tar works OK. Make sure PHCO_33201 (fbackup) and PHKL_29898 (stape driver) are installed.

There is no need to rewind a tape for fbackup -- this is the first positioning command issue by fbackup, one of the reasons that you can't append fbackup jobs on the same tape.

[Luc Monnens]

Applying the patches solved it.
Upgrade to 11.i is emminent now.
I'll have to see if I need to re-apply the patches.
Thanks all and sorry for the late closure.

Kind regards,

Luc