Questions about store open automation / LTFS in production use

[okwap]

Few questions about store open automation:

1. Is store open automation deprecated? If it's deprecated, is there any alternative solution available to use LTFS feature with HP tape libraries?

2. Does LTFS provides less durability compared to classical tar store way? For example,  if there any track error on index partition of LTFS, I loss all the data, right?

[HPE_StoreOpen]

1. Is store open automation deprecated? If it's deprecated, is there any alternative solution available to use LTFS feature with HP tape libraries?

StoreOpen Automation was obsoleted on 19^th February 2018 with an immediate EOSL (end of support life). The StoreOpen Standalone application for LTFS now supports the 1/8 G2 Autoloader (Vers 3.3.0 for Windows). For LTFS application compatibility for the MSL libraries please consult the HPE Data Protection Compatibility matrix at: https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?docId=c04616269

2. Does LTFS provides less durability compared to classical tar store way? For example,  if there any track error on index partition of LTFS, I loss all the data, right?

LTFS is designed to be more robust than simple tar.  Two separate copies of the index are written in each partition, and additionally indexes can be written periodically (e.g. every 15 minutes) to ensure you always have a recent copy on tape.  Furthermore data files are stored as independent entities, so there is no need to have to read all the archive to retrieve a single file.

[okwap]

Hi StoreOpen team thank you for your answers. I have more questions about the LTFS index.

From my understanding, there are just two index replicas in LTFS, one is in the index partition and the other is appended in the data partition. My questions are:

1. Why you say "additionally indexes can be written periodically (e.g. every 15 minutes) " since there are just two index replicas in LTF?

2. Assume my concren is durability. In StoreOpen settings if I config it to flush the index when finishing each file write operation, will it causes addtional significant tape seek time overhead since the drive needs to write index in both index and data partition? 

[bucovaina78]

1) Has the funcionality of StoreOpen Automation been merged with Standalone? Like multiple tapes/subdirectories/robotic arm movement? 

2) Is there a technical white paper which elaborates a bit further on the robustness of LTFS?