From HP-UX tar to Linux tar

[rottek]

Dear sirs,

I have some 4mm dat cartridges (4GB) made in a HP-UX 11.00 with a standard tar command (tar -cv files_to_backup) made with a scsi dat drive HP 35470A.

After more than one year I need to restore some data on a linux system (Red Hat 7.2) which has the same dat drive.

Now I tried to list the content of the cartridges but without any result.
In particular I used the following command:

$tar -tvf /dev/st0

After this command the lights on the tape driver blink and the tape run. But after 3-4 seconds everything stop and the prompt $ apper after the above command whithout any other message.
I tried also to use the following command

$tr -tvbf n /dev/st0

replacing n with different numbers (1-10-20-512)
but with the same result.
I tried all the above also as "su" and with other similar cartidges.

After the first blink and run of the tape driver if I repeat the command I get istantly the prompt symbol $ without any activity on the tape. To have a new activity (blink for some seconds) I have to extract and re-insert the tape.

Please, what I can do to list (and extract) my files from the catridges? What else can I try?
Thanks

 

[LeoSteph]

Hey ,

one of your problem comes from that tar HPUX does not respond exactly to the tar GNU .
one think to test , and verify that your DAT are ok , is to build a new tar with GNU tar sources on HPUX to test
for example GNU tar support the zip format not the HP UX tar .
Try it , it can be a good way to a workaround


Leo-Steph ;-) !

 

[ifincham]

Hi,

Have you tried using device /dev/nst0 ?

Regards

 

[rottek]

Thank you.

But I don't have the possibility to find and use a HPUX right now.

I tried also /dev/nst0. But the result is the same.

Is there the possibility to get some software that could be compatible with the HP-UX tar?

Regards.

 

[pcunix]

I'm not sure that it's the HP tar.

I've had problems with HP tapes that were simply because HP-UX uses a different (hardware) block size.

You can use mt setblk to force the hardware block size- darned if I remember what HP-UX uses, but try 0 (variable), 512, 1024 and 2048.

Tony Lawrence
SCO Unix/Linux Resources

http://pcunix.com

tony@pcunix.com