How do I set up an Onstream drive for use with Linux?

First, to set up the drive you must be logged on as superuser or root

Now, verify that the correct modules are running for the drives:

ADR SCSI Drives st
ADR IDE Drives st + ide-scsi
SC Drives osst
DI Drives osst + ide-scsi
USB30 osst + usb-storage

To do this, use the LSMOD command, this will list all the running modules. If a module we don't want running, usually ide-tape when trying to use a DI drive or st instead of osst for echo drives (DI30/SC30(e)/SC50/USB30), we remove it using the RMMOD command (rmmod ide-tape). We then add any modules we need running that aren't using the modprobe command. (modprobe osst).

Once the modules are loaded, we should be able to access the drive by the device name, which will be /dev/stx where x is the device number if it uses the st module, or /dev/osstx.

Now that the drive is recognize, you can use the mt and tar commands to access the drive.

mt -f /dev/st0 status -- gives device status
mt -f /dev/st0 retention -- retentions the tape
mt -f /dev/st0 eject -- ejects the tape
mt -f /dev/st0 erase -- erases the tape

Here are some common tar commands to get your backup going.

tar cvb 64 -f /dev/st0 / -- Full backup
tar xvb 64 -f /dev/st0 -- Full restore
tar cvb 64 -f /dev/st0 {directories} -- Partial backup
tar xvb 64 -f /dev/st0 {directories} -- Partial restore
tar dvb 64 -f /dev/st0 -- Verify
Note: Verify will only work from the root directory.
tar tvb 64 -f /dev/st0 -- Table of contents

In case you were wondering, 64 is the blocksize setting for the drive.