Virtual TapeServer 8.0 Configuration Guide

Enabling and Performing Tape-to-tape Exports

You can export a virtual tape to physical tape using a tape-to-tape export job. This provides a

one-to-one mapping of virtual to physical tape. You can export to a drive in a library or a

standalone drive. When creating the tape-to-tape export job, you can choose whether the data

remains in virtual tape format or host format.

If VTS encrypted data written to a virtual tape using the Data Encryption feature, the tape

remains encrypted when it is exported if virtual tape format is chosen. If you choose to export

an encrypted to in host format, the tape is decrypted before it is exported.

Note You can also export a virtual tape to physical tape using a stacked export job, though

this requires backup management application integration. See Enabling and

Performing Stacked Exports on page 35 for more information.

At a glance, here is an overview of the steps to enable, configure, and use tape-to-tape exports:

1. Configure the physical drive or library for use with tape-to-tape export jobs. You can also

enable VTS to export encrypted virtual tapes, if all drives in a library support encryption.

This step is performed using the web interface before creating jobs.

2. Export virtual tapes by creating stacked export jobs using the web interface. If necessary,

you can also import exported tapes. Or, you can configure the VTSPolicy command on the

VTS server to automatically export tapes.

To restore a virtual tape that was exported by a tape-to-tape export job, you can import the

virtual tape. This restores the virtual tape to VTS so that a host server can then use the tape.

Refer to the help for importing instructions.

Configuring the physical drive or library

After attaching a physical drive or library to VTS as described in the Quick Start Guide, you

can export virtual tapes to physical tapes. Before creating tape-to-tape export jobs, you can

• assign a user-friendly name to a drive or library

• dedicate a drive or library (and its drives) for tape-to-tape exports

• enable VTS to export virtual tapes that were encrypted by the Data Encryption feature of

VTS, if all drives in the target physical library support encryption (LTO-4 and LTO-5

drives only)

• disable an external tape device, making the device unavailable during job creation