Recycle volumes w/o loading tapes?

[UnixSkunk]

Hi, all...
ANyone out there know a way to recycle tapes without having to reload them into the machine, then inventory them? Currently, I am scanning the tape labels(barcode) into a file, then doing the following

for i in `cat tapelist.txt`
do
nsrmm -d -v -y $i
done

I THINK this is removing each tape label from the machine's database. Is it possible to just recycle the tapes instead? Is there a way to set a certain group to expire after three months, so the tape can be automatically re-used? I know thats a lot of questions...Many thanks!!


UnixSkunk - Tux's Evil Nemesis

 

[605]

What you actually do is to remove the media db entries.
You may of course also set the volumes to recyclable.

Of course you may just relabel/recycle the media whenever
needed and overwrite the automatism.

The browse and retention dates apply to save sets, not to groups.
There is only the date you need to set and they will expire automatically.
You may either do this by setting the appropriate policies
or you may run "nsrmm -S ssid -w browse_date -e retention_date", of course for each save set.

 

[UnixSkunk]

Thanks 605...
What I am curious about is if there is a way to have this done automatically. I get back about 180-200 LTO tapes per week from Iron Mountain, and they tend to come mixxed in together. I could manually remove any volume with savesets older than 3 months, but that would be quite time consuming, and my manager doesnt like me "wasting time". Ugh.
The current problem thats causing this question, is that I have 3 LTO machines/libraries. If I write a tape on one machine, then, 3 months later, use that tape on machine #2, Machine #1 still has a record of that tape. And if the backups on that tape were all unchanged incrementals...it will still ask for that tape. Also, because Machine #1 thinks that tape still exists, it hasnt made a NEW backup of those files...I am constantly getting asked for tapes from other backup admins...tapes which dont exhist anymore.
ANy suggestions would be most helpful. Is anyone else running into this problem where they need to keep tape lists updated on multiple machines? Or expiring tapes after a certain period of time? ANy help would be much appreciated!




UnixSkunk - Tux's Evil Nemesis

 

[goony]

I have two separate libraries/Legato servers on my site and I went to marking the tapes with colored dots (Avery makes them 1/4 inch size, e.g.

http://tinyurl.com/ouew)

at the far end of the tape face (off the right end of the barcode label).

SysA = red, SysB = green, etc.

It is then easy to steer the tapes to the proper tape library and with some simple command magic you can aid you in putting tapes back in that are expired or nearly ready to expire. I have my groups set to 'use from other groups' and 'allow other groups to use' so any expired tape can be automatically used by any group.

bash-2.03$ cat test2
/usr/sbin/mminfo -oet -q 'volretent<&quot;+5 days&quot;' -q 'family=tape' -r 'volume,volretent,location'


bash-2.03$ sh test2  
 volume         expires location
000019L1         expired L15 Rack Stay
000015L1         expired L15 Rack Stay
000039L1         expired L15 Rack Stay
000008L1        09/16/03 L15 Rack Stay
000031L1        09/19/03 L15 Rack Stay
000033L1        09/22/03 L15 Rack Stay
000013L1        09/25/03 L15 Rack Stay
000027L1        09/26/03 L15 Rack Arrive
000012L1        09/27/03 L15 Rack Arrive
000024L1        09/29/03 L15 Rack Arrive
000007L1        09/28/03 L15 Rack Stay
000034L1        09/30/03 L15 Rack Arrive

bash-2.03$

 

[goony]

I guess I left out a bit: Yes, you can set browse and retention times to control when savesets expire, but if you have a mix of spans (say one month and one year) you don't want those mixed spans going onto the same tapes. Why? Because then you might have a tape that has 95% of the savesets expired (after one month) and the other 5% of the savesets not expiring for a year. The entire volume will not expire until the very last saveset expires- not very efficient use of tapes!!

Best bet with mixed retention needs is to create separate pools, so the one-year retention goes to its own pool and the one-month stuff goes to a different pool.

 

[605]

Excuse me, but it seems you want to make NW follow your
scheme. This is o.k. and understandable but it will not
always work to your satisfaction. In your case, it is hard
to schieve the expected as NW simply works differnetly.

NW does not use media, it uses pools, not taking care about
separation. Whenever a media of that pools is available, NW
will use it. The consequence is that for various scenarios,
you simply must use separate pools.

To be able to recycle tapes automatically, all save sets on
that media must have the status recyclable. As goony pointed
out, just une save set with a longer retention policy will
prevent the media from becoming recyclable.

NW does not recycle tapes when they expire - NW does not
know something like a scratch pool/available pool. NW will
only recycle a media if
- it is recyclable
- and he needs a tape.
This is important because it assures maximum data security -
you can recover data as long as the media has not been recycled.
Well, you can even recover after it has been recycled but this
is another story.

 

[UnixSkunk]

Hi, 605 and Goony.
Many thanks for the responses. That answered my question...I think. I understand that NW uses pools. We have pools set up for 3 Months, 1 Year, and 7 years. It is the three month pools we were having trouble with. I was just uncertain if you could set a pool to erase/recycle tapes for that pool after 3 Months. Thanks again!

UnixSkunk - Tux's Evil Nemesis