I asked:
> Gentle managers:
>
> We have a large number of Macintoshes that are not backed up
> regularly, and a 4mm DAT drive on a Sun that is underused. Does
> anyone out there do backups from Macintoshes to a tape drive on a Unix
> machine?
Boy did I get a lot of me-toos! Fortunately, I also got a large
number of very helpful responses. I haven't tried anything on the Mac
side yet (I'll report when I do), but I expect I will try CAP/Macdump
and just buy Mac hardware for this if that doesn't work easily.
Most people recommended a program called Macdump that works with CAP
(Columbia Appletalk Protocol). Copies are available in many places; I
think I found the one I got at sumex-aim.stanford.edu. I was told
there are also versions available at:
munnari.oz.au
bbn.com:/pub/MacDump
I was told the munnari version is more recent than the bbn one. One
person had switched from this to a 4mm drive on a Mac to Retrospect
because he had a vague worry this might not be getting all his files.
One compiles Macdump with many of the CAP libraries and include files.
It comes with an INIT that you install on your Macs. The dumps are
triggered from the Sun. It works by copying the Mac disk to a
partition on the Sun, and then writing that to tape. Some people
don't use Macdump, but do this by hand.
Erdwing Coronado likes a package called NETATALK (from
terminator.rs.itd.umich.edu) that he says performs the same services
that CAP does, and is easier to understand. He uses it to copy files
off Macs to the Suns, and then archives them on tape.
Two people tried this and switched to a program sold (cheaply---I was
told $200, with source $50 more) by the University of Utah. If you
want to compile the source, you need a MacTCP source license. I
haven't pursued this further. The contact for this is:
Loretta Cruse
University of Utah
Center for Software Science
3190 Merrill Engineering Building
Salt Lake City, UT 84112
Net: cruse@cs.utah.edu
Phone: 801-581-5017
Fax: 801-581-5843
I don't know how recent the contact information is.
I was told that using Retrospect (a Mac backup package) and Liken (a
commercial Mac emulator) is unlikely to work, because Retrospect tries
to access the tape drive at a low level, and Liken probably won't work
with it. I haven't called the vendor to follow this up.
Two users wrote that one could use Retrospect to write to a Sun
partition and then write that to tape. It sounds like this is doable
except that one has to worry about getting the tape written on the
workstation. The MacDump software probably doesn't have as pretty a
GUI as Retrospect does, but it does know about tape on the Unix end.
S. Cowles said one could probably use uShare and Partner, which make
Mac filesystems look like NFS ones to your Sun. You can then use
dump. They're available from:
555 chorro street
san luis obispo, ca 93405
805-541-3000
robert magee, regional sales manager (robm@iptech.com)
Mr. Cowles uses the Retrospect->Sun->tape method.
Brian Dickson reported there's free software that does the same thing.
It's called afpmount, and is available from ftp.funet.fi
Thanks to:
julian@syd.dwt.csiro.au (Julian Dryden)
davec@cs.ust.hk (Dave Curado)
Robert Dal Santo <robert@psych.psy.uq.oz.au>
john@eos.oncology.uthscsa.edu (John Justin Hough)
lhume@macadam.mpce.mq.edu.au (Leigh Hume)
Bevin Steer <CCBJS@levels.unisa.edu.au>
skn@frame.ie ( Sankar Nayar )
esanborn@cadence.com (Ed Sanborn)
Erdwing.Coronado@med.umich.edu (Erdwing Coronado)
John Valdes <valdes@geosun.uchicago.edu>
paulo@dcc.unicamp.br
scowles@toolik.stanford.edu (S. Cowles)
nghoff@albert.monsanto.com (Norman G. Hoffman)
mschwage@next3.corp.mot.com (Mike Schwager)
vanbc!bchspd!brobinso@ssl.Berkeley.Edu (Bret A. Robinson)
lam@mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu (Ken Lam)
Martin Achilli <ACHILLM%IMIHSRA.BITNET@cmsa.berkeley.edu>
yu@math.duke.edu (Yunliang Yu)
Brian Dickson <trigraph!briand@ssl.Berkeley.Edu>
wallen@cogsci.ucsd.edu (Mark R. Wallen)
Ted Beatie <tcb@cipr-diva.mgh.harvard.edu>
ericb@telecnnct.com (Eric Burger)
John R Mudd <jrm@pgroup.com>
bala@synopsys.com (Bala Vasireddi)
---- Ted Rodriguez-Bell Experimental Astrophysics Group Space Sciences Lab, UC Berkeley ted@ssl.berkeley.edu (510)-643-6214
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Fri Sep 28 2001 - 23:08:32 CDT