[Info-vax] Delete a file from a tape?

[Bob Koehler]

In article <hb2s13$2pu$1 at news.belwue.de>, gartmann at nonsense.immunbio.mpg.de (Christoph Gartmann) writes:
> Hello,
> 
> I have a tape with a few files (backup savesets). The last file on tape is
> an incomplete saveset. Thus, I would like to delete this last file from the
> tape. But OpenVMS 7.3-2 lists the file, asks for confirmation to delete and
> finally refuses to do so. My next attempt was to recreate the saveset in
> question via BACKUP with /REPLACE. Here I got:
> 
> %BACKUP-F-POSITERR, error positioning MKB200:[000000]13OCT09MAC358.BCK;
> -SYSTEM-F-OPINCOMPL, operation is incomplete
> 

   Do you know how many files are on the tape, prior to the partial
   file?  If not you can mount the tape as a labeled tape and use
   DIRECTORY to count the files, but ask for enough directory
   information to force an output line for each file.  You'll have to
   abort the operation when the tape drive reads the EOV mark.

   Then mount the tape /foreign.  Use "set magtape/skip=file:x" where
   x is 3 times the number of backup save sets you want to keep.  Then
   "set magtape/end_of_file" twice.

   That will make the tape logically end after the last full saveset.