[daip] tape probs

[Eric Greisen]

Ka Chun Yu writes:
 > Hi Patrick,
 > 
 > > >   FITLD1: Create 20000430    .LINE  .   1 (UV)  on disk  4  cno    6
 > > >   FITLD1: TAPIO: RECORD LENGTH  24318 INCONSISTENT WITH BLOCK SIZE  2880
 > > 
 > > This looks to me like a bad record on the tape, or a bad read.  In either
 > > case it's likely a drive/media problem.  One way of verifying this would
 > > be to use Unix utilities to read the tape, e.g. if it's the fourth file on
 > > the whole tape, do this:
 > > 
 > >     bash$ mt -f /dev/rmt/0ln rewind         (make sure you're at the start)
 > >     bash$ mt -f /dev/rmt/0ln fsf 3          (skip the first three files)
 > >     bash$ dd if=/dev/rmt/0ln of=FILE4.FITS bs=2880
 > >     bash$ echo $?
 > >     0
 > >     bash$     
 > 
 > I followed your advice with the following commands and results:
 > 
 >   > mt -f /dev/rmt/0ln rewind
 >   > mt -f /dev/rmt/0ln fsf 3           
 >   > dd if=/dev/rmt/0ln of=FILE4.FITS bs=28800
 >   read: I/O error
 >   18112+1 records in
 >   18112+1 records out
 >   > echo $?
 >   2
 > 
 > It did manage to write out (I'm guessing) about half the line data:
 > 
 >   -rw-r--r--   1 kachun   521650174 May 18 15:00 FILE4.FITS

    There does seem to be a real error preventing you from reading the
data in file 4.

 > 
 > > >   FITLD1: This usually means you're at END-OF-TAPE
 > > 
 > > ... but not always.  Though it may have been a short read followed by an
 > > EOF (end of file) that was actually on the tape.  Another experiment you
 > > could try if you have Solaris is:
 > > 
 > >     bash$ tcopy /dev/rmt/0ln
 > > 
 > > which will tell you how many files are on tape, and how many records.
 > > It'll also show total size, so you will know if the capacity of the tape
 > > was likely exceeded (2.2G for Exabyte 8200, 5G for 8500, etc.)
 > 
 > Similarly I run:
 > 
 >   > tcopy /dev/rmt/0ln
 >   file 1: records 1 to 132: size 28800
 >   file 1: record 133: size 2880
 >   file 1: eof after 133 records: 3804480 bytes
 >   eot
 >   total length: 3804480 bytes

        This is showing only the first file.  Perhaps you should do

mt -f /dev/rmt/0ln fsf 3

and then do the tcopy command to examine the 4th file.
 > 
 > > >   FITLD1: Destroyed  1 extension files of type HI
 > > >   FITLD1: Destroyed UV image file: catno=      6 disk= 4
 > > >   FITLD1: Purports to die of UNNATURAL causes

     FITLD should not hve destroyed all your files, although the last
one is not usable and would need to be deleted.  I will look at this.
You may run FITLD one file (or 2 or 3) at a time and succeed in
loading the first 3 files tht way.  The problem is that the main data
file is gone.  Did you run PRTTP on this tape before leaving Socorro?


Eric Greisen