Tape drives and protection of tapes (using tar)

[Joseph S. D. Yao]

> If UNIX(tm) were really a user friendly system, it would support
> `labeled' tapes and then you would have this problem. The system
> would read the tape label before writing on it to ensure it really
> was the one that was requested.

I would like to disagree strongly (but in a user-friendly manner).
The operating system has no business whatsoever interpreting what
is on a raw device like a tape, unless it is mounted as (say) a
file system.  If UNIX had decided on some label format, even ANSI
label format, then it would not be possible (as possible?) to use
it as such a powerful tool for decrypting the rest of the world's
tapes.  Have you ever  t r i e d  interpreting, say, a TOPS-20
tape under VMS?  I have.  No fun.  And that's from the same
manufacturer!

	Joe Yao		hadron!jsdy at seismo.{ARPA,UUCP}