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From: jrw@hropus.UUCP (Jim Webb)
Newsgroups: misc.wanted,net.wanted.sources,net.micro.att,net.micro
Subject: Re: Help with tape drives and 3B2s....
Message-ID: <739@hropus.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 18-Oct-86 10:55:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: hropus.739
Posted: Sat Oct 18 10:55:00 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 21-Oct-86 05:47:58 EDT
References: <2304@psuvax1.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Labs, Holmdel, NJ
Lines: 40
Xref: watmath misc.wanted:31 net.wanted.sources:2948 net.micro.att:1620 net.micro:15785


                                                            :-)
> I have about 5 AT&T 3B2/300s linked together over 3BNET (ack!).  2 out of
> the V have direct 9600b UUCP lines to our Vaxen.  I want to know if
> their is any way that I can dump my 3B2 to a tape drive hanging off of
> our vax.  I don't care what density.  I just sick of the floppy drives, 
> the way they they munch on disks, make nice sounds and stuff.  Thanks
> in advance for any info/help/sources.

Hmm, at 9600 baud, it would an awful long time to backup 30 Meg :-).

I am going to make the assumption that your vax is running System V...

AT&T did at one point offer COMMKIT ethernet for the vax that was compatible
with 3Bnet.  I have it running on some vaxen here networked to some 3b20's
and it works just as well as 3bnet does, meaning it gets the job done.

Now, I haven't tried this, but I suppose it is possible to say something
to the effect of:

	nisend -d vax -a 666 -f "vaxtape" "3b2disk"

Of course, now you have to write a utility to be able to extract a file
from this tape on the vax if you don't want to redo the entire slice of
the 3b2.  I wouldn't think it to be too difficult, tho.

What would really be nice is to have nisend be able to interactively
read stdin and write across the net so you could do something like this:

	find . -print | cpio -ocm | nisend -d vax -f "vaxtape"

If you could do this, no disk space problems would present themselves.

Now, on another front, you could buy expansion modules and
use cartridge tapes.  I don't know if you could just buy one and just power
up and down the 5 3b2's and plug it in the back, or if it would be
worth the trouble.
-- 
Jim Webb             "Out of phase--get help"          ...!ihnp4!hropus!jrw
		"Use the Force, Read the Source"