recycled tapes are not reused

[bkrieg0001]

Hi,
I've got a very strange problem.
Volumes in my pools are correctly marked as recycled but if backup runs and tape is full these recycled tapes are not reused.
Backup won't continue if there is no unlabeled tape in the library or i relabel one of these recycled tapes.

This started after upgrading to 7.1.1
Now i'm running 7.1.2.

Anyone got an idea ??

Bernie

 

[speculos]

You have to set the "Autochanger\Preferences\Auto Media Management" parameter to "Yes".

Default value is "No", witch means "do not label tapes automaticly".
Be carefull if other server use the same autochanger...

 

[bkrieg0001]

And that's the real stupid thing - Auto media management is set to "yes" since years.

 

[Chapter11]

My auto-media management is set to "No", and I have zero problems with Networker doing auto-labeling of recyclable tapes.

You didn't give enough information, but you might look at your Pool Preferences tabs, and see if you have the "recycle to other pools" and "recycle from other pools" set appropriately for your environment.

In my case, all "recyclable" tapes are in the same pool ("Blank"), which is set to permit recycling to other pools, and the pools that get used automatically all have "recycle from other pools" set.

 

[barye]

I have 7.1.1 Legato. I have this problem. This problem appears when there is a device restriction on the pools.I removed device restriction, recycle volumes are used automatically.

But I need device restriction because I have mixed media.

Also will recycle to other pools set "NO"

How can I solve?

Configuration:
Legato 7.1.1

 

[bkrieg0001]

Same for me as for barye. I need to have device restriction
besause i don't want to have my savesets distributed over all my libraries.
Is there another solution than removing device restriction ?
This seems to be a bug because i've never had this before upgrading to version 7.1.x !

 

[605]

Be careful if you use a "mixed media" configuration with NetWorker only - it is not supported.

However, I found that it will work - NW will actually do it according to the Manpages which casrries the same statement for years ... from the NW 5.x manpages for nsr_pool:

devices
This attribute lists the ONLY devices volumes from this
pool are allowed to be mounted onto. If no devices are
listed, volumes from this pool may be mounted on any
device.


The keyword is "mounted". Now for labeling NW must not mount the tape - in fact it can not mount the tape until it is labeled. However the consequence for a "mixed media" environment is that ...although you have selected certain devices for a specific pool, the media can be labeled by other devices as well... . This may cause problems if you use Auto Media Management, because NW will use an incompatible tape drive for the label process.


Let's assume that you have a jukebox with DLT4000s and DLT7000s along with DLTIV media. It may result in the fact that the media will be labeled by the DLT7000 (although you only selected DLT4000s for that pool). Such label can not read by the DLT4000 at MOUNT time because the density simply does not exist for this device.

Please cross check the behaviour after you labeled the media in the correct drive.

 

[bkrieg0001]

I do not have mixed media libraries. What i have is two libraries attached the the NW server. One library pure AIT and one pure DLT. So labeling with an incompatible drive is not possible.
I never had problems with current settings before V7.

 

[barye]

In my configuration;

I have SAN enviroment.(3 clients-Sun clients)
Sun solaris 2.8 Backup server

L700e Storage Tek library - 2 X LT0 + 4X 9840B + 2 X 9840

After Legato 7.1.1 upgrade, I have no mixed media.( LTO drives added newly - 2 weeks ago )

The same problem appears in the same drive type.

I also think this seems to be bug.

But how can I solve this or workaround (includes restriction)?

Did you report Legato?

email adress: barye@kocbank.com.tr

if you have a solution,please share information.

Thanks.

 

[605]

So ... one has mixed media, the other one has not.

To prevent "... savesets distributed over all my libraries ..." you must no necessarily use device restrictions. Just make sure that the media for one pool is only available in one jukebox and do not set the pool options "recycle from/to other pools".

As there is obviously something different using NW 7111, it would be good to know from which versions you upgraded.

 

[barye]

hi bkrieg0001,

if you solve this problem, please post it here.

Thanks....

 

[bkrieg0001]

Hi all,

my problem disappeared after some time.
It seems like tapes having been written with V6.xx are recycled but not reused.
Tapes written with V7.xx are being recycled and reused.
So - after having manually relabeled each of the volumes, it runs as it should.

I'm really glad to get rid of that Legato-bullshit the next weeks. It really has become worse with every upgrade.

Bernhard

 

[Chacalinc]

your problem is a bug in NW, take a look to thread480-902739

LGTObug posted the solution in that thread.

Cheers.