Backup Central

We recently upgraded our Amanda server to a new machine, and migrated from
Amanda 2.4.0 to 2.4.4p2. However, while our old server used to rewind the
tape after the dumps were finished, our backup administrator has discovered
that the new machine does not.

We're using the same tape drives, and essentially the same configuration
file that we used on the old machine (we just increased the amount of
holding space we have). The OS on the backup server has changed, from
Solaris 2.6 to Solaris 9. The tape devices are still the same though
(/dev/rmt/0n is specified in the amanda.conf file - but I know you're
supposed to list the no-rewind device there.)

I've looked through the FAQ-O-MATIC, the Amanda chapter from Curtis Prescott's
book, and Google searches, and I haven't found anything that addresses this.

Is there an option that I'm missing, or some change between 2.4.0 and 2.4.4p2
that would have caused this? Would upgrading to 2.4.4p3 help? (I missed
that the newer version was out when it was downloaded.) If nothing else, I
suppose I could just tell it to do an 'mt -f /dev/rmt/0 rewind' when Amanda
finishes, but that seems like a bit of a kludge.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!


Brian

--
Brian Sebby (sebby < at > anl.gov) | Distributed Computing Administration
Phone: +1 630.252.9935 | Computing and Instrumentation Solutions
Fax: +1 630.252.4601 | Argonne National Laboratory

On Wed, 21 Jul 2004 at 3:27pm, Brian Sebby wrote

We recently upgraded our Amanda server to a new machine, and migrated from
Amanda 2.4.0 to 2.4.4p2. However, while our old server used to rewind the
tape after the dumps were finished, our backup administrator has discovered
that the new machine does not.

We're using the same tape drives, and essentially the same configuration
file that we used on the old machine (we just increased the amount of
holding space we have). The OS on the backup server has changed, from
Solaris 2.6 to Solaris 9. The tape devices are still the same though
(/dev/rmt/0n is specified in the amanda.conf file - but I know you're
supposed to list the no-rewind device there.)

You *must* list the no-rewind device, but I'm pretty sure that that one
(/dev/rmt/0n) *is* the non-rewinding device.

I've looked through the FAQ-O-MATIC, the Amanda chapter from Curtis Prescott's
book, and Google searches, and I haven't found anything that addresses this.

Is there an option that I'm missing, or some change between 2.4.0 and 2.4.4p2
that would have caused this? Would upgrading to 2.4.4p3 help? (I missed
that the newer version was out when it was downloaded.) If nothing else, I
suppose I could just tell it to do an 'mt -f /dev/rmt/0 rewind' when Amanda
finishes, but that seems like a bit of a kludge.

AFAIK, amanda has never rewinded the tape when done. But then, I haven't
used anything older than 2.4.1. Your "kludge" is exactly what I do, along
with backing up the amanda databases onto other systems, in my nightly
backup script.

--
Joshua Baker-LePain
Department of Biomedical Engineering
Duke University