worm disk archive

[Steven Grimm]

SOME NOTES ON USING THE IBM3363 OPTICAL DISK SYSTEM

We use an IBM ps2/30 that is dedicated to controlling an IBM 3363 WORM
optical disk drive.  The interface to the drive is the ftp program
(ftp(1)).  The ps2/30 is running in dedicated ftp server mode.  The system
is protected by password.

The 3363 drive uses 200 megabyte removable cartridges.  Each cartridge
costs $25.

New directories can be made only at the ps/2 console.  Directories do not
appear in ls or dir listings.  You must know the name of the directory you
want.  The current working directory and drive persist across ftp
sessions. Care should be taken to leave ftp with the current drive and
directory "D:\".

DOS filename restrictions are in effect: a file name can be as many as
eight letters or numbers optionally followed by a dot optionally followed
by as many as three letters or numbers.

While the drive is "write once", the IBM disk driver maintains multiple
versions when a file is "overwritten", and previous versions can be
"promoted" from the console to be the current version.  Similarly, while
files can be marked as "deleted", previous versions remain, and there is
an "eradicate" function available from the console that supposedly "really
zeroes" a file.

Here is an example of how to archive a an entire directory:

1. Arrange to have a directory made on the drive, and get an account
name/password combination activated.

2. ftp ps230.ucsc.edu as follows:

1 % ftp ps230.ucsc.edu
Connected to ps230.ucsc.edu.
220 PC Resident FTP server, ready 
331 Password required
230 User logged in 
ftp> pwd
257 "D:\" is the current directory 
ftp> cd user
250 Chdir okay
ftp> binary
200 Type set to I, binary transfer mode 
ftp> put "|tar cf - . | /usr/ucb/compress -v | crypt" 890306.tar
200 This space intentionally left blank <   > 
Enter key:150 Opening connection 
Compression: 29.48%
226 Transfer complete 
local: |tar cf - . | /usr/ucb/compress -v | crypt remote: 890306.tar
4748015 bytes sent in 3.4e+02 seconds (14 Kbytes/s)
ftp> get 890306.tar "|crypt | uncompress -v | tar tvf - > 890306.toc"
200 This space intentionally left blank <   >
150 Opening connection
Enter key:
226 Transfer complete
local: |crypt | uncompress -v | tar tvf - > 890306.toc remote: 890306.tar
4748015 bytes received in 4.4e+02 seconds (11 Kbytes/s)
ftp> ftp> cd ..
250 Chdir okay
ftp> pwd
257 "D:\" is the current directory 
ftp> quit
221 Goodbye