Job failed because "tape cartridge was manually de-mounted"

[pshute]

For the first time ever, one of our tape jobs ran out of space on the tape. We have a single cartridge LTO-6 drive.

At about 1am I got an email saying "Job Backup to Tape Job 1 - Weekly requires a tape to be added to media pool Weekly tapes (Library: IBM ULT3580-HH6). See the corresponding job session in the management console for details."

Around 7am I ejected that tape, put in a blank, ran an inventory so it would display the tape in the GUI, then added the blank tape to the "Weekly" pool. But the job had already failed, apparently just after I ejected the tape: "28/06/2018 7:07:50 AM :: TapeDrive alert: The operation has failed because the tape cartridge was manually de-mounted while the tape drive was actively writing or reading.."

Yes, I ejected the tape by pushing the eject button on the drive. But why should that cause the job to fail? Would it have failed if I'd ejected it via the GUI?

The error message says it was ejected while actively writing or reading, but was it really reading or writing? Surely the job was finished with that tape 6 hours earlier. And I thought the drive was locked and couldn't be ejected while it was in use anyway. There were no lights flashing on the drive.

Questions:
- Is there any way to get the failed job to continue?
- Is the full tape usable? (It contains 99% of the job)
- Is this a bug? Is there any real reason why manual ejects make a tape job fail?
- If there's a technical reason for the failure, shouldn't the alert specify that the tape shouldn't be ejected manually?
- Shouldn't the job have ejected the tape itself anyway? Backup Exec ejects when it runs out of space.

[pshute]

- Shouldn't the job have ejected the tape itself anyway? Backup Exec ejects when it runs out of space.

If I tick the "Eject media upon completion" box in the job options, will that also make it eject when it runs out of space?

I had assumed it would eject if it ran out of space anyway, so I deliberately hadn't ticked this box so that operators would have a simple way of knowing if there was a problem. Ie if they found the tape had ejected, they would know something had gone wrong.

[pshute]

I ran the tape job again. Now the tape is full, so I need to put a new tape in. But when I try to eject it via the GUI, it says "28/06/2018 12:29:11 PM Error Failed to eject tape Weekly 4 Error: All drives are busy in IBM ULT3580-HH6".

So there's no way to eject the tape.

[pshute]

I'm treating this as a bug now. I've logged case number #03076241.

[pshute]

I'm running the tape job for a third time with "Eject media upon completion" ticked. Hopefully that will also eject when it needs the new tape.

[pshute]

I'm running the tape job for a third time with "Eject media upon completion" ticked. Hopefully that will also eject when it needs the new tape.

That worked - it ejected and is waiting for the next tape to be inserted. But will it wait 11 hours till I get there tomorrow to do that?

[pshute]

I changed the tape and the job completed in a couple of minutes, so multi tape backups work fine, but only if you tick the "eject media ..." option.

[Dima P.]

Hello Peter

Yes. In order to eject tape media automatically you must check that box in job settings. Tape job will wait for a new tape to be inserted for 72 days, if I am not mistaken.

I'm treating this as a bug now. I've logged case number #03076241.

We actually agreed to fix the existing behavior and eject the full media for standalone drive whenever tape media is full (without looking at checkbox setting)

[DPrime]

Was this bug fixed? I would like to be able to either eject the first tape or have it eject automatically when a additional tape is needed. It used to work like this in previous versions. I do not want to check "Eject media upon completion" because I need the last tape to stay in the drive for other jobs. Was this fixed?

[Dima P.]

DPrime,

The fix should be provided in the upcoming Update 4. Cheers!