MT(1)                      OpenBSD Reference Manual                      MT(1)

NAME
     mt, eject - magnetic tape and removable media manipulating program

SYNOPSIS
     mt [-f tapename] command [count]
     eject [-f] tapename

DESCRIPTION
     The mt utility sends commands to a magnetic tape drive.  By default, mt
     performs the requested operation once.  Operations may be performed mul-
     tiple times by specifying count. Note that tapename must reference a raw
     (not block) tape device.  If tapename is of the form ``host:tapename'' or
     ``user@host:tapename'', mt writes to the named tape device on the remote
     host using rmt(8).

     The available commands are listed below.  Only as many characters as are
     required to uniquely identify a command need be specified.

     eof, weof  Write count end-of-file marks at the current position on the
                tape.

     fsf        Forward space count files.

     fsr        Forward space count records.

     bsf        Back space count files.

     bsr        Back space count records.

     rewind     Rewind the tape (count is ignored).

     offline, rewoffl
                Rewind the tape and place the tape unit off-line (count is
                ignored). On non-tape removable media, the offline command
                causes the media to be ejected when the last operation on it
                closes (i.e., the filesystem is unmounted).

     status     Print status information about the tape unit.

     retension  Retension the tape (if this operation is supported by the tape
                unit).

     erase      Erase the tape (if this operation is supported by the tape
                unit).

     eom        Forward space to the end of the media.

     blocksize  Set the tape blocksize to count bytes.

     density    Set the tape density code to count as specified in the SCSI2
                specification.

     eject is simply an alias for mt, with the offline command specified.

     If a tape name is not specified, and the environment variable TAPE does
     not exist, mt uses the device /dev/rst0.

     mt returns a 0 exit status when the operation(s) were successful, 1 if
     the command was unrecognized, and 2 if an operation failed.

ENVIRONMENT


     If the following environment variable exists, it is utilized by mt.

     TAPE        mt checks the TAPE environment variable if the argument
                 tapename is not given.

FILES
     /dev/rst*                      raw SCSI tape interface
     /dev/rmt*                      raw magnetic tape interface
     /usr/src/sys/scsi/scsi_tape.h  list of SCSI2 density codes

SEE ALSO
     dd(1), ioctl(2), mtio(4), environ(7)

HISTORY
     The mt utility appeared in 4.3BSD.

OpenBSD 3.0                      June 12, 1996                               2
