SUMMARY: tape processes that don't die

From: Irene Kam (kami@verdi.iisd.sra.com)
Date: Fri Aug 15 1997 - 10:23:24 CDT


Hello,

My original posting talked about erasing a tape and the command
was hanging. Many of you suggested that perhaps the command
wasn't hanging, it's just that it takes a LONG time (3-6 hours) to erase
a 8mm tape. Thanks, this is useful to know.

However, I still think the command was hanging because:

1) I did several ps during the time and they all showed that
   my "mt erase" command was sleeping

2) at the end of the 3 hours, I got the following message on the
   console:

   WARNING:
/iommu@f,e0000000/sbus@f,e0001000/espdma@f,400000/esp@f,800000 (esp0):
        Disconnected command timeout for Target 4.0
WARNING:
/iommu@f,e0000000/sbus@f,e0001000/espdma@f,400000/esp@f,800000/st@4,0 (s
t4):
        SCSI transport failed: reason 'timeout': giving up

Hence, I think the command was hanging and finally timed out.

Anyway, I got a great suggestion from Hans Schaechl on what to do
if your tape command is blocking but you need to use the tape drive
soon: (thanks Hans)

        "What may help you in short terms is:
        switch off the tape-drive - change the drive's
        SCSI-ID - switch it on again - do a drvconfig -
        tapes - now you should be able to at least use
        your tape drive for your backups (don't forget
        to adjust the SCSI-ID-info in your dump-scripts
        or whereever you have this info configured) un-
        til you're able to reboot your machine without
        interfering the users."

And thanks to the following people for their suggestions and
informing me that it takes a long time to erase a tape,

Glenn Satchell - Uniq Professional Services <Glenn.Satchell@uniq.com.au>
robin.landis@imail.exim.gov
Ray Brownrigg <ray@isor.vuw.ac.nz>
Michael Baumann <baumann@proton.llumc.edu>
"Andrew Moffat" <amof@SubaruSparcDev.subaru1.com>
clg@csph.psu.edu (Craig L. Gruneberg)
"Juan Nicolas Ruiz N." <nicolas@ciens.ula.ve>
SEYMOUR@LEPTON.NPL.WASHINGTON.EDU (Richard Seymour)

Irene



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