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From: simon@ms.uky.edu (G. Simon Gales)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.xenix
Subject: Re: Xenix Multi-tape backup
Message-ID: <13710@s.ms.uky.edu>
Date: 17 Jan 90 02:01:07 GMT
References: <569@runxtsa.runx.oz.au> <2603@thebes.Thalatta.COM> <13694@s.ms.uky.edu> <1281@ispi.UUCP>
Reply-To: simon@ms.uky.edu (G. Simon Gales)
Organization: U of Kentucky, Mathematical Sciences
Lines: 30

In article <1281@ispi.UUCP> jbayer@ispi.UUCP (Jonathan Bayer) writes:
>simon@ms.uky.edu (G. Simon Gales) writes:
>>There _is_ at least one version of Xenix whose tar is broken.  You can make
>>multi-volume tars, but when you try to reload (un-tar?) them, tar will prompt
>>for the next volume only if a file was split across the volume and the next
>>one.  If a file isn't split across volumes, tar will simply stop at the end
>>of the volume.
>
>This is not a broken tar.  Tar has no way of knowing how many volumes a
>backup crosses UNLESS a file is split across two volumes.  All you have
>to do is to continue the tar by issueing the same command when it stops.
>
Tar could mark the end of an archive when it has more files to write. Tar 
could still be restarted on the second or third or n'th volume, but would
continue to prompt for all of the disks/tapes left in the set.

SCO tar's do differ.  At least one older version is 'broken' whereas the 
2.3.2 286 version is 'fixed', interchange 'fixed' and 'broken' till you
like it.

Some tar's let you start extracting in the middle of the set, even if a
file was split across volumes, and will restore only the extent provided.



-- 
Simon Gales@The University of Kentucky
   simon@ms.uky.edu             | 'Fate... protects fools, little children,
   simon@UKMA.BITNET            |  and ships named Enterprise.' 
   {rutgers, uunet}!ukma!simon  |                           - Riker, ST:TNG