Arch Linux

conn-fused

Member

Registered: 2011-06-19

Posts: 28

SCSI Tape Support: mt-st package no longer exists?

Good morning,

I use the mt-st package for archiving to tape. On a recent installation I ran "pacman -Ss mt-st" and found nothing. No sign of it in the AUR either, and I've been unable to find any news on where or why it has gone. Does anyone know anything?

Thanks!

alphaniner

Member

From: Ancapistan

Registered: 2010-07-12

Posts: 2,810

Re: SCSI Tape Support: mt-st package no longer exists?

I found [what I assume is] the most recent package on the ARM. Went to the location of the source code, and discovered that it hasn't been modified since 2008. Maybe that's part of the reason Allan stopped packaging it.

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Lone_Wolf

Administrator

From: Netherlands, Europe

Registered: 2005-10-04

Posts: 12,930

Re: SCSI Tape Support: mt-st package no longer exists?

https://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHBA-2012-1167.html

looks like Red Hat may have a maintained version of that program, and if they do chances are CentOS has it also.

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conn-fused

Member

Registered: 2011-06-19

Posts: 28

Re: SCSI Tape Support: mt-st package no longer exists?

Thank you both for the replies.

The link to the code (I guess I can simply package it myself) and the evidence that the package is still in use (and so hasn't been abandoned in favour of something I haven't yet heard of) are both helpful.

Now a couple theory questions, if anyone is interested:

1) Is anyone aware of a replacement for mt-st that tape users may have been moving to over the past few years?
2) Is it common for code to not change for a long time? I'd think not - it looks more like abandonment than maturity - but I don't know. Is this always a warning sign that you shouldn't be compiling that code?
3) Does (should) Arch have a mechanism to let users know when and why a package disappears? I would have loved to have had the former packagers thoughts on abandoning the package, but instead I couldn't even determine (online) who the former packager had been.

alphaniner

Member

From: Ancapistan

Registered: 2010-07-12

Posts: 2,810

Re: SCSI Tape Support: mt-st package no longer exists?

1) I have never had any issues with the mt binary, so I've never contemplated moving to something else. As I understand it, mt uses low-level SCSI commands which are a well established standard. I've only used mt on Ubuntu and CentOS though, and it's possible they were packaging from a fresher source.
2) It may be that Red Hat has completely taken over maintenance, so that the code is not actually abandoned. I was just going by the source that was used to build the last Arch package.
3) As I said, the former packager of the Arch package was Allan. I found that by looking at the .PKGINFO file which was contained in the package. I just extracted the contents with tar. You could also install the package and use pacman -Qi. Or there may be a way to query a package directly with pacman.

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But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.
-Lysander Spooner