SUMMARY 1/4" compressed tape backup

From: Bradley S. Piatek (bpiatek@nova.gmi.edu)
Date: Thu Apr 20 1995 - 09:56:33 CDT


Thanks to everyone that replied. The basic concept from each response
was to try dump | compress | dd.

Here are the commands I used to get the root and /usr directories
backed up on a single tape.

dump 0cdstfu 1250 620 18 - /dev/sd0a | compress -c | dd of=/dev/nrst0
dump 0cdstfu 1250 620 18 - /dev/sd0g | compress -c | dd of=/dev/nrst0

The command mt -f /dev/rst0 rewind, of course, will rewind the tape.

To view what has been put on the tape I used this command.
dd if=/dev/nrst0 | uncompress | restore -tvf -

To restore the tape, I believe this command should work.
dd if=/dev/nrst0 | uncompress | restore -xvf -

This technique enabled me to backup both partitions to a 150mg, 620 ft
Dysan 1/4" data cartridge.

The only odd thing I noticed using this technique, was that dd always
returned a write error. This did not appear to affect anything because
I was able to view the contents of the tape to verify something was
actually written to it. Anyone know why dd insists on returning a write
error?

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