On Friday 29 November 2002 09:16, marc.bigler AT day DOT com wrote:

> I would like to rotate between multiple sets of 8 tapes because my changer
> supports maximum 8 tapes. So I have defined the following in my
> amanda.conf:
>
> dumpcycle 5 days
> runspercycle 5
> tapecycle 8
> runtapes 2
> When one set of 8 tapes is finished I will take it offsite and then start
> up with the next set, I plan to have maybe 5 sets which i will constantly
> rotate which means overwritting stuff. What kind of labelling should I use
> for that ? I was thinking of something like
>
> nameXX-Y
>
> where XX is the tape number
> where Y is the set letter, for example:
>
> mysite03-B
>
> that would be tape number 4 from set B

This, like the people who want to do fulls on Friday and incrementals every 
other day, is another example of wanting to get Amanda to work YOUR way 
rather than HER way. You can of course, if you want, do that, but know why 
you're doing it. I'm guessing from what you've written that you want to have 
everything backed up at level 0 once per week but only do backups on weekdays 
(because you have runspercycle 5) but you would usually have dumpcycle 7 days 
in this case because your dump cycle takes up 7 calendar days. I also presume 
your dumps can take up to two tapes (because you have runtapes 2 :-) ) so I'd 
suggest the following

dumpcycle 7 days
runspercycle 5
tapecycle 40  (or however many tapes you have)
runtapes 2

and then you simply label your tapes (physically and with amlabel) mysite01 to 
mysite40 (rather than 00-39 - easier for humans, and amanda doesn't care)

With runspercycle  5 and runtapes  2 a "complete set" of tapes is anyway not 8 
but rather ten. Doing it the way I suggest means that there is no confusion 
of sets - tapes simply have numbers. You'll have to reload the changer when 
it's used the last tape and the you can send that changerload of tapes 
offsite if desired. Personally, I'd keep the previous load of tapes in my 
office to cope with demands for recovery of recently accidentally erased 
files - in my experience by far the most common reason for restores.

Kindest regards,


Niall  O Broin