CompuServe Thread

John- I am also looking for an NT tar. In the two messages I can see, I can't tell if you've found one or not. Have you? -Michael Shook Read action !re ply Enter reply. (/EXIT when done) 1: Yes, and no. I could ulpoload a 'tar' that works with the system 2: tape drive, which is called \\.\tape0 on the command line, 3: as in 'tar -xcvf \\.\tape0 *.c' . 4: 5: But I'm not convinced it really works. I tried There are several problems. 6: One, without a corresponding 'mt', you can't position the tape. 7: I tried to Under the assumption that this 'tar' and the system tape driver w 8: ould simply append consecuitivetive 'tars''s, I tried making three 9: archives, but was unable to read them correctly on another 10: machine. I tThe 'tar' gave a messageab about an erro when itr when it 11: tried to write the filemakrrk. I didn't hear the tape rewind, ., 12: so It hthought it was appeandnnding. 13: 14: On the Internet, I got a message from a guy named Hamlion BIX who 15: seemed to know a lot. He'ere's what he said: 16: 17: Subject: 'tar' desired w/tape support 18: Date: 5 Apr 1994 15:25:28 GMT 19: 20: I'd like to read and write 'tar' tapes on my WinNT system with my 21: WHoops. 22: Whoops., I', I'll try again with the whole thread: 23: 24: .Subject: 'tar' desired w/tape support 25: .Date: 5 Apr 1994 15:25:28 GMT 26: . 27: .I'd like to read and write 'tar' tapes on my WinNT system with my 28: .Exabyte tape drive. 29: . 30: .I found one GNU 'tar' ported to WinNT on wuarchive, but it is limited 31: .to working with files on disk, not tapes. And unless I've missed 32: .something obvious, there's no /dev/mt0 for WinNT. 33: . 34: .And I found another port of GNU 'tar', as a lone executable with no 35: .docs, but in this executable, 'strings' found evidence of the WinNT 36: .system tape calls. But I don't know how it expects to name the tape 37: .device on the command line. 38: . 39: .I also found 'tar' for OS/2, but examination of the source code 40: .revealed a different set of tape manipulation calls than those 41: .described in the VC++ 32-bit SDK. 42: . 43: .And in my searches on Compuserve, I tripped the attention of 44: .Congruent, who sent me info about their Toolbuster CD. For $200, 45: .they've ported and enhanced GNU tools. Is their disc worth it? Am I 46: .missing something, but doesn't that mean their improvements can be 47: .redistributed? 48: . 49: .From: pfeifer@lf.hp.com (Mark Pfeifer) 50: .Newsgroups: comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.win32 51: .Subject: Re: 'tar' desired w/tape support 52: .Date: 5 Apr 1994 22:21:18 GMT 53: .Organization: Hewlett-Packard Little Falls Site 54: . 55: .I think the MKS Toolkit for Windows NT has a tar that will work with 56: .tape drives. 57: . 58: .From: hamilton@BIX.com (hamilton on BIX) 59: .Subject: Re: 'tar' desired w/tape support 60: .Date: 6 Apr 94 14:49:21 GMT 61: . 62: .exe00314@vnet.net (exe00314) writes: 63: . 64: .>I'd like to read and write 'tar' tapes on my WinNT system with my 65: .>Exabyte tape drive. 66: . 67: .The tape device on NT is called \\.\tape0. If you have more than one 68: .(some folks do :-), they're called \\.\tape1, \\.\tape2, etc. 69: . 70: .Your Exabyte drive will likely be a bit cranky to use under NT. The 71: .problem is that the NT tape device driver is just plain awful. It 72: .works best with QIC streaming cartridge drives but not so well with 73: .either DAT or 8mm drives. No application vendor can do much about 74: .that. You will likely find that to use it, you'll have to do some 75: .experimentation to find a blocksize that works. MS acknowledges that 76: .only blocksizes which are power-of-2 multiples x 512 bytes are 77: .supported and indeed, that does seem to be the rule with DAT's and 78: .8mm's. 79: . 80: .That said, you should be able to get things working satisfactorily. 81: . 82: .Since you have a tar already, albeit one that only reads/writes tar 83: .files on disk, one cheapo alternative is just to write a little cat 84: .program to copy them on/off the tape drive. Just remember that the 85: .CreateFile call to open the drive must specify OPEN_EXISTING, not 86: .OPEN_ALWAYS. Also, the buffer should always be paragraph (16-byte) 87: .aligned; that's not documented anywhere, to my knowledge. Use the 88: .tape api's (e.g., SetTapeParameters) if you find you need to set the 89: .blocksize, etc. 90: . 91: .A better solution, obviously, is going to be a tar that really 92: .supports the drive (as well as can be, considering the driver 93: .limitations). You'll also presumably want an mt (or similar utility) 94: .for doing simple things like rewinding the tape, writing filemarks, 95: .etc. There are several sources, including my own company. If you'd 96: .like more info or a demo disk (specify x86, MIPS or Alpha), let me 97: .know. (The demo includes the fully-working tar so you could try 98: .before you buy.) 99: . 100: .Regards, 101: .Doug Hamilton hamilton@bix.com Ph 508-358-5715 102: .Hamilton Laboratories, 13 Old Farm Road, Wayland, MA 01778-3117 103: . 104: .From: mthorn@cix.compulink.co.uk ("Mark Thornton") 105: .Subject: Re: 'tar' desired w/tape support 106: .Date: Wed, 6 Apr 1994 17:14:56 GMT 107: . 108: .I uploaded an executable with an accompanying txt file as win32tar.* 109: .to cica. The magic name for tape devices was //./tape0 (replace '0' 110: .as appropriate). I will upload the source and more docs when I get 111: .back to ordinary length days. (soon I hope). 112: . 113: .Mark Thornton 114: .Optrak Distribution Software Ltd. 115: 116: —— 117: 118: What's my latest take on all this? Well, I'm aggravated wthat wi119: th all the altruistic talk about GNU software efforts, 120: it still means that garagae software companies will 121: ehancenhance the code, port it to new enbvirvironments, a122: nd chanrrge $200 for it for the few months before the 123: public domain catches up. For that matter, I wish 124: Microsoft would ship better tape support, if they boitherther to s125: hip any at all. 126: /post Message # 185619 posted