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5.1: Requirements

  1. The floppy tape driver distribution file `ftape-3.04d.tar.gz' (this manual is a part of it). Final releases of the distribution can be found at

    ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/kernel/tapes/

    You can also down-load the package from

    http://www-math.math.rwth-aachen.de/~LBFM/claus/ftape

    The latter node has also some other links to floppy tape related information and might contain older versions of the ftape package as well as recent development versions. If you can't access this page at all then please try again some hours later. If this doesn't work then please drop me a short (and kind) note stating that the page appears to be down for hours. I'll see what I can do about it.

    See Compiling ftape, for information on configuring and compiling the driver.

  2. The kernel sources for Linux 1.2.13 or later. If you know what you're doing then you can use the driver with older kernel versions, but you have to hack the ftape and modules support in the kernel yourself!

    You need to run a kernel without support for ftape compiled into the kernel image. Please check the file /proc/devices for a line like `27 ft'. If /proc/devices contains such a line(1), then you need to reconfigure your kernel without support for ftape enabled, i.e. answer no to the

    Ftape (QIC-80/Travan) support 
    

    question. Recompile and install the new kernel in the usual way.

    Note that there were quite a bit of problem reports on compiling ftape with kernels of the 1.2.* series. However, some of these should vanish when compiling the drivers without the CONFIG_MODVERSIONS option. Other problems may vanish when reading through the special parts of this manual that are dedicated to those kernels (see 1.2.13). I arrived at compiling ftape with the following kernels:

  3. Utilities for managing kernel modules. Please regard the following not that much as a recommendation, but as a hint what I am using. If you have modules utilities installed (you probably have) and they work fine for you, then there is no need to install another version. I didn't try the most recent modutils package yet. `2.1.34' isn't the most recent.

    In principle, new versions of the modules utilities should be able to insert modules into older kernels. Please read also the file /usr/src/linux/Documentation/modules.txt and the documentation that comes with the set of modules utilities you are using.

    You can down-load the modules utilities from the same places as the kernel sources. This used to be

    ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/Linux/kernel/linux/

    but

    ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/

    is the primary site nowadays.

    WARNING: Don't use `modutils-2.1.23.tar.gz'. It seems that the depmod program contained in this package produces wrong dependencies. This program seems to hold the view that the ftape module depends on itself being loaded before itself which causes modprobe to try to load ftape before loading ftape before loading ftape before loading ftape before loading ftape ... until this infinite recursion causes modprobe to abort with a core dump due to a segmentation violation.

    `modutils-2.1.34.tar.gz' worked fine for me. With this version it was even possible to insert ftape compiled without CONFIG_MODVERSIONS into a 2.0.30 kernel that had been configured for use with versioned symbols. I suggest that you solve module insertion problem by using a recent version of the modutils package. See CONFIG_MODVERSIONS. I have tried the 2.1.34 version of the modutils package with a 2.0.30 kernel and it works just fine. There is a more recent modutils package that I haven't tried.

    For the time being, new versions of the modutils package seems to show up first at

    ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/alphabits/

    You should check this location if you can't fetch the latest `modutils' package from another site.

  4. Tools like mt and tar to use the driver (these can be found in the GNU `cpio' and `tar' packages). There are also various other backup packages that might be useful. Some of them can be found at

    ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/system/backup/

    A very usable commercial backup program is bru which is sold by `EST' (http://www.estinc.com).

    When searching for a no-cost backup solution for large networks then you should consider using the amanda package available from

    ftp://ftp.amanda.org/pub/amanda/

    There is a special version of the GNU mt program (see mt) included in this package which can be found in the `./contrib/gnumt/' subdirectory of this ftape-3.04d distribution. The program is automatically compiled when compiling the kernel driver (see Compiling ftape) and is installed as `/usr/bin/ftmt' by default. It contains support for some special, new ioctls that are supported by the zftape front end to the low level ftape driver (see File System Interface). There is also a bit of information about the use of the mt program in this manual (see Ioctls).

  5. Of course, you also need a tape drive installed and the appropriate tools to compile the sources (i.e. a recent binutils package and gcc).

  6. When using a so called `plug and play' controller card (also known as `plug and pray') then you should also get the isapnptools package which has a www page at http://www.roestock.demon.co.uk/isapnptools/. `plug'n play' cards are those controller cards that cannot be configured by setting jumpers.

  7. It shouldn't be necessary to rebuild the pre-formatted versions of this manual (i.e. the thing you are reading right now). However, if you need or want to rebuild either the `info', `dvi' or `HTML' version of the manual then you really need


(1) Of course, the ftape device in /proc/devices will also show up if any version of the ftape module is loaded.


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