AIX

Just a background, my volume group backup consumes 5 tapes. I backup using find . -print....

Now, I would like to restore a file which i know is from the 3rd tape. Using restore command

restore -xvqf /dev/rmtx ./<path>/<filename>

The system always ask for the first tape.

Is there a restore command that can read directly to the 3rd tape?

thanks

NO there isn't, as there is a header on the first tape that must be read first.

You could reorganize your backup and - instead of backing up in one big archive - use several small backup archives. In this case you could access each archive separately, but this won't help you with your current backups, only with the ones to take in the future.

What ross.mather said stands, think of it like a book: you would have to consult the table of contents first to know where a certain chapter starts. The TOC is at the beginning of a book, though, regardless of where the chapter will be.

I hope this helps.

bakunin

Bakunin has a good idea, split your backup processes up so that you have a separate archive on each tape.

However you need to watch that you keep it balanced and know where you are putting everything. It takes more of your time to maintain that kind of system to make sure it works. And you'll probably want to keep an index file separately on each tape.