On Mon, Jan 03, 2005 at 10:36:51AM -0500, pll+amanda AT permabit DOT com wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> Is there an easy way to change the amanda label of a tape that's been 
> written to?  Short of that, is there an easy way to recover the 
> contents of the tape in amdump form, then re-label the tape and use 
> amflush to get the contents on the newly/properly labelled tape?

Quick answer is sure, just overwrite the 32KB first file on the tape.

Longer answer dependes on what you want to do with the tape and how
much you expect amanda to remember about the tape, its contents, and
its new label.

To overwrite it, do a "dd if=<tapedevice> of=<sometmpname> bs=32k".
Maybe make a copy of <sometmpname> so if you mess up you can restore it.
Next edit the file <sometmpname> to change the tape name. Then
rewind the tape and do the same dd command with 'if' and 'of' reversed.

Note, after doing this amanda has an invalid concept of what is on the
tape.  It still thinks the other tape exists and has valid contents.
Depending on what new tape name you choose, the modified tape is either
not known by amanda's index (a new tape name) or does not match the
index's listing of the contents.

So depending on what you plan to do with the modified tape this is may
or may not be a reasonable thing to do.  If you don't need to use the
index (i.e. use amrestore and not amrecover) then fine, modify it and
amrmtape the original name.  Otherwise a different action may be the
wisest choice.

jl
-- 
Jon H. LaBadie                  jon AT jgcomp DOT com
 JG Computing
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 Princeton, NJ  08540-4322      (609) 683-7220 (fax)