On Tue, Apr 01, 2003 at 11:03:08AM -0500, Keith Higgs wrote:
> 
> That said, there are lots of opportunities for additional
> configuration options.  Our single tape drive system is physically in
> a secure area that is staffed by our central IT department.  I have
> full access to the room but, we need to work out a process/procedure
> for their over-night operator to change out the tapes for us on a
> regular schedule.  
> 
> I would really like options to send tape administration reminders to a
> specified email address as part of the amcheck process.  I could then
> schedule amcheck to run long enough ahead the call to amdump for the
> operator to change the tape if needed.

Not to set aside your suggestion, because I think it's a worthwhile one,
but here is a potential workaround which you could implement to solve
your problem in the near term:

1) Set mailto in amanda.conf to an address where a procmail script is
listening out of aliases(5).

2) In that procmail script do some initial error checking along the
lines of "does this look like an amanda report?  did it come from the
amanda user?" and redirect anything that doesn't look like a legitimate
amanda report to /dev/null or to the postmaster with an informative
error message.

3) Test to see if a line in the message body matches some regex devised
to only pick out tape errors.

4) Pipe a copy of any messages which match the rule into a script which
automatically parses them to find out which tape amanda is looking for
and sends a form mail to the overnight operator asking him to insert
that tape.

5) Send the report on to the real amanda administrator (you).

Or, alternately, talk someone into buying you a library.  ;-)

Cheers,

Brandon D. Valentine
-- 
Systems Administrator
Center for Structural Biology
Vanderbilt University