Installing a tape drive in a PC.
Introduction:
In our Telecom scenario in BSNL, most of the Taluk Headquarters Exchanges
or even all of the SDCA Headquarters Exchanges are CDOT MBM of MAX-L
/ MAX-XL type. CDOT switch supports POI configuration. In the multi-operator
environment, the CDOT switch is one of the best POI which stores all
types of Trunk Group Call Billing Records (tgcbr). The new software
platform 2_2_1_4 supports TRAI implementation and V5.2 Interface Signaling.
Data backup and software installation are done with the help of Catridges,
the tape drives in the IOPs. Unix is the operating system in the CDOT
switch.
Necessity for a Tape Drive in a PC:
Subscribers detail bill records and metering information are backed
up in catridges using a Tape Drive. Similarly trunk group bill records
for the computation of IUC , ‘tgcbr’ files also taken
in a catridge.
The present situation goes like this; the computation of IUC charges
are to be done trunk group wise and submitted to the concerned authority
for verification in the readable form in a CD. A PC with a CD writer
and Tape Drive becomes essential.
The technology development in the computer area made this work very
simple, that a PC in your table can be installed with a Tape Drive.
Unix / Linux operating system supports direct commands for the usage
of tape copying huge volume of data within seconds. Hence installation
of Unix or Linux is to be done in your PC.
But you are already having a machine with a lot of Windows applications
working on it; How to resolve?
Dual booting Linux Windows:
Having been using Unix for about 5 to 6 years, the speed and stable
working of Unix is felt very much. The need of the day made me to
think about Dual system. There is no need to get rid of Windows to
run Linux. There are many ways to run both of them on the same PC.
Windows and Linux can live comfortably on the same machine, even the
same hard drive. The choice of operating systems can be made at the
boot up sequence when you switch on the PC. This configuration
is known as the ‘dual-boot’ configuration.
Before the actual installation, some basic information about Partition,
File system and Boot loader are to be understood. A partition is a
way of sectioning of space on a hard drive. Drives can be divided
into several partitions. This is often done to separate the program
from data and also for storing multiple operating systems on the same
drive.
Each operating system has its own boot loader. Windows 95 and 98 use
‘IO-SYS’ and ‘DOS-SYS’. Windows NT uses ‘NT
LOADER’ and Linux uses ‘LILO’(Linux Loader). There
are also commercial and shareware boot loaders, such as Norton System
Commander. RED HAT Linux has got its own boot loader to go with the
existing Windows.
There are also several different file system used by Linux and Windows.
Windows uses FAT, FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS (NT file system). The native
file system for Linux is ext2, although it supports many other file
systems.
FAT32 supports the accessing of WIN partition from Linux, with the
help of a kernel version 2-0-34 and higher, which is available in
RED HAT Linux.
Setup requirements:
P3-Pentium 3 machine with 8GB hard disk, 128 MB RAM, CD Writer, Tape
drive, Floppy drive.
I have selected Windows 95 and REDHAT Linux version 7.1.
With a prime partition of 4 GB, Windows 95 has been installed, and
in the rest of space Linux has been loaded with Dual Boot option.
Tape drive configuration in Linux:
Tandberg tape drives (SLR2 model) are available in our recovered old
version VL IOPs and they can be configured in the PC installed with
Windows 95/ Linux.
In the white paper submitted by Tandberg Company, it is stated that
SCSI Adaptor ‘Adaptec AHA-2940uw’ as the most suitable
one for configuring Tandberg SLR2 serial tape drive.
It is the generic SCSI driver for Linux . Linux kernel reads the SCSI
driver during boot up and if the tape drive is attached to the SCSI
bus, the tape id is also read by the kernel and reports as below or
similar to the following:
ADAPTEC SCSI AHA 2940 UW
SCSI id 2 Tandberg TDC 3800 and so on.
If not, the kernel package should be rebuild with proper version.
Certain Linux does not support tape drive. RED HAT supports this and
no additional Driver Software is needed for SCSI and tape drive.
The tape drive is identified by a device file ‘ /dev/st0 ’.
Here after, for the usage of ‘cpio’ command with tape
drive, the device name is, ‘/dev/st0’.
Commands and usage:
• Mounting Windows file in Linux is to be done.
$ mount /mnt/windows
• File ‘/etc/fstab’ one line is to be added.
/dev/hda1 /mnt/windows vfat defaults 0 0
• To check the tape drive is functioning, insert a catridge
in the tape drive and give command in Linux command mode.
$ mt –t /dev/st0
• The catridge rewinds and stops.
• Now go to windows directory and make a new folder or directory
and copying of files from tape can be done in this directory.
• ‘cpio’ is the command for reading and writing
a tape or ‘copy in’ and ‘copy out’ files.
• Usage is given below:
Option Description
o Output to tape
i Input from tape
t List the contents of tape
Example:
For copying files from tape to the present directory, the command
is
$ cpio –i < /dev/st0
For copying a separate file to the tape, the command is
$ cpio –o >/dev/st0
$ xxxx (Type the file name to be copied)
$ xxxx (System displays the file name)
$ <ctrl>d
$ (Cursor returns and operation successful)
for copying all files in a directory, the command is
$ ls | cpio –o >/dev/st0
Conclusion:
Installation of CD Writer is very simple and it is not explained here.
Burning of a CD can be done in Linux back ground as well in Windows
back ground.