Thanks heaps to everyone that replied!
Alan Rollow (alan_at_nabeth.cxo.dec.com)
Thomas P. Blinn (tpb_at_zk3.dec.com)
Ryan R Ziegler (Zieglerr_at_novachem.com)
Alan Davis (Alan.Davis_at_digital.com)
Brian Leverson (brian_at_aa.washington.edu)
Jim Belonis (belonis_at_dirac.phys.washington.edu)
Special Thanks to Edward C. Bailey (ed_at_redhat.com)
The Original Question:
I need to be able to send the magazine controller a command that
lets me load a specific tape (and not treat the magazine as one
huge tape).
Looking through the *very* limited info in the owner's manual
I saw a table with the SCSI command set and found the relevant
command "Move Medium" but I have no idea how to talk to it. I
figured it had to be some sort of ioctl() call but I don't know
where to find the command sending struct, etc, etc....
The various "snipped" replies:
>From Alan Rollow: ------------------------------------
The TZ887 is a tape drive supported by the current version
of the Media Robot Utility. V1.2 includes an API as well
as the CLI and GUI of previous versions. That's your best
bet. I can get you the SPD and license numbers if you need
it.
If you don't want to spend the ~$300 for a license and media,
you can get out the documentation of the SCSI CAM User Agent
interface and spend a lot of time trying to make it work,
but it isn't easy.
More recent versions of the TZ887 should include a copy of
MRU, but it seems unlikely that MRU V1.2 would have made
into boxes yet.
-------------------------------------------------------
>From Thomas Blinn: ------------------------------------
Look at the reference page for the scu utility.
-------------------------------------------------------
>From Ryan Ziegler: ------------------------------------
We use the mcutil command to move tapes from slots in the
stacker to the drive...
-------------------------------------------------------
>From Alan Davis: --------------------------------------
You need two subsets, CLCMC and MRU. CLCMC is the SCSI CAM
Utilities, MRU is the Media Robot Utility. There may be an
additional license required, depending on what
licenses you already have.
-------------------------------------------------------
>From Brian Leverson: ----------------------------------
DEC has a product named StorageWorks Media Robot Utility (MRU)
which does exactly what you want. I don't know what it costs
but I have verified that it works with our Quantum DLT 4500
tape library.
I was trying to track down some freeware until I got MRU. It
appeared there was at least one government site which had
developed a tape manipulation program that might work. Let me
know if this interests you and I can try and track it down.
Following is the last message I got from the person who
previously maintained the tape control code I mentioned. He provides an
e-mail address for the person he handed it off to for further
maintenance. I never bothered to follow up on it as I had gotten DEC
MRU. Hopefully the new contact can
provide you with the information you need.
*snip*snip*snip*
Ed Bailey> I've handed the sources over to Claudio Strizzolo; Ed Bailey>
he should be able to help you. His address is:
Ed Bailey> Claudio.Strizzolo_at_trieste.infn.it
--------------------------------------------------------
>From Jim Belonis: --------------------------------------
Try to find the Digital Unix program
loader_stuff.tar somewhere on the web. Here is where I found
it years ago. It may not control your loader, but will give
you the backbone of a program to modify to your needs.
moocow.niehs.nih.gov
in pub/loader-stuff/
--------------------------------------------------------
>From Ed Bailey: ----------------------------------------
I sure can give you some pointers. :-) Since I no longer work
at NIEHS, and I no longer have access to Digital Unix boxes
and TZ877s, I handed over my program to Claudio Strizzolo in
Italy. He's done some stuff with it, (such as adding
VMS-style allocation capabilities) but the basic code can
be found at:
ftp://www.ts.infn.it/pub/unix/loader-stuff.tar.gz
His modified version of my program is called TapeUtils, and has
a web page at:
http://www.ts.infn.it/computing/TapeUtils/
With the information in loader-stuff, and his new minty-flavored
version, you should be able to get your TZ877
moving take like there's no tomorrow... :-)
---------------------------------------------------------
All in all:
I wasn't willing to spend money on the DEC kit if I could avoid it, so I
hunted down Ed Bailey who originally wrote some code that I
could use and he put me in the right track (as per message above).
Thank you all!
------------------------------------------------------------
Natalia Salzberg
STN Atlas (Australia): natalia_at_stn-atlas.com.au
UTS Programmer's Society: natalia_at_progsoc.uts.edu.au
http://www.progsoc.uts.edu.au/~natalia
Received on Fri Dec 12 1997 - 00:19:53 NZDT