tapeexercise(8)                                                 tapeexercise(8)

NAME

       tapeexercise - exercise a tape drive

SYNOPSIS

       for UNIX
              tapeexercise [ -vBEFP ] devname
       for Windows
              tapeexer [ -vBEFP ] devname

DESCRIPTION

       The tapeexercise program writes sample data to a tape, and tests to see
       if positioning and read operations perform  as  expected.  It  needs  a
       write-enabled tape on the indicated (no-rewind) drive.

       tapeexercise should be used with extreme caution.  The following points
       apply to testing a tape using the tapeexercise (UNIX) or tapeexer (Win-
       dows) command:

              -  Do  not  use the tapeexercise or tapeexer command on any tape
              containing data that you will  need  later,  because  the  tests
              overwrite data currently on the tape.

              -  After  testing  is completed, re-label any tape that you have
              used in testing. If the tape is not  re-labeled,  it  cannot  be
              used for subsequent backups or recoveries.

              - Using barcode-labeled tapes for testing is not recommended. It
              is more difficult to re-label  a  tape  with  a  barcode  label,
              because  the  barcode label is linked to the volume id, which is
              in the media database.

       Successful completion is indicated by a  ''<test name>:  test  begin,''
       ''<test name>:  test ok'' pair for each test that is run. An example is
       as follows:

              BasicTest: test begin
              BasicTest: test ok

OPTIONS

       -v     Operate in verbose mode.

       -B     Perform only the basic test.

       -E     Perform only the EOT test.

       -F     Perform only the File Space Forward test.

       -P     Perform only the 'SCO' positioning test.

       If none of the options BEFP are set, then all of  the  tests  are  per-
       formed.

       devname
              The device name of the tape device under test.  This should be a
              non-rewind device, following the local operating system  conven-
              tion.

EXIT STATUS

       The following are the error numbers with which tapeexercise could exit:

       ETAPE (40) : Error in accessing and/or using the tape device
       EBASICTEST (41) : Error while running the basic test
       EEOTTEST (42) : Error while running the EOT test
       EFSFTEST (43) : Error while running the FSF test
       ESCOTEST (44) : Error while running the SCO test

       Note that if more than one test fails, the exit code will  reflect  the
       last test that failed.
       
       For all other errors, tapeexercise exits with a non-zero error, usually
       1.

SEE ALSO

       nsrmmd(8), Hardware Compatibility Guide.

LIMITATIONS

       The  tapeexercise  program  will generally fail for QIC drives, because
       these devices do not support all of the functionality assumed by  tape-
       exercise,  most  importantly, they do not support back-skip-file.  Such
       devices may work with nsrmmd(8);  consult  the  Hardware  Compatibility
       Guide for a complete list of supported devices.

NetWorker 8.0.1 		Dec 02, 12 		tapeexercise(8)