View contents of second volume of recovery tapes

[David Barkman]

Hi, I am trying to recover the archive from a set of ignite backup tapes. This is an ignite backup that spans two tapes. I used the following for the first tape, but it doens't work for the second tape:

mt -f /dev/rmt/0mn fsf 1
tar tvf /dev/rmt/0mn

I also used fsr and fss to try to read the second tape.

Any ideas on how to recover from this second tape?

This is an R server running 11.0.

Thanks!

[Pete Randall]

I believe that you shouldn't have to fsf the second tape, that's just to get you by the boot info on the first tape. Try just the tar tvf /dev/rmt/0mn.


Pete

[Patrick Wallek]

For the second tape just do:

# mt -f /dev/rmt/0mn rew

This'll make sure the tape is rewound.

# tar -tvf /dev/rmt/0mn

This should list the contents. You do NOT need to 'fsf 1' on the 2nd volume of the tape since the BOOT area will not be there and the tar data will start at the beginning of the tape. The boot area will be at the beginning of the first tape, hence the need to do the 'fsf 1' to get to the tar data.

[David Barkman]

Thanks for your replies. I tried the above and got the following error:

directory checksum error

This error happens fairly quickly, then it looks like it checks the rest of the tape since it doesn't come back to the prompt for a few minutes.

I'm pretty sure the tape is good since it ran without error when the ignite prompted for it. And the reason I'm not using the data from that ignite recovery is because I don't have the third tape in the ignite series and the machine is incomplete and wont boot.

Thats another problem though and I would rather just tar from the second tape.

Thanks!

[Jeff Schussele · Accepted solution]

Hi David,

Couple of things to try:

1) Have BOTH tapes rewound before you attempt extraction.
The tar volume should continue on to the next tape.
Do you get prompted to insert next tape?
Are you sure that's tape #2 & not tape #3?

2) Try using pax for the listing - after the mt fsf 1 command run
pax < /dev/rmt/0mn

Rgds,
Jeff

[David Barkman]

Thanks everyone for your replies. Jeff's reply led me to the answer. To view an ignite archive for a single ignite tape, or the first in a series, run the following to get to the right spot on the tape:

mt -f /dev/rmt/0mn fsf 1

then to view the archive run

pax -f /dev/rmt/0mn

Ignite uses pax to create the archive. Tar works for a single tape, or for the first tape, but not the second for a multiple tape ignite. To read the second tape do the following:

mt -f /dev/rmt/0mn rew <--want to make sure you're at the begining of the tape

pax -f /dev/rmt/0mn

This will just list the data. You can then extract the data from the pax archive. Read the man page for it as there are many options, or consult your UNIX in a Nutshell book.

Thanks again!