Changer problems

This article is a part of the Troubleshooting collection.

Problem

$ amtape Weekly device
amtape: Could not load current slot.

$ amcheck Weekly
Amanda Tape Server Host Check
-----------------------------
Holding disk /backups/Weekly: 3017 GB disk space available, using 800 GB as requested
Changer problem: no slots available
(expecting a new tape)
Server check took 0.489 seconds

Amanda Backup Client Hosts Check
--------------------------------
Client check: 1 host checked in 6.365 seconds. 0 problems found.

(brought to you by Amanda 2.6.4)

Explanation

At least one case with this is the changer being successfully installed on the system yet not accessible by the Amanda user. It can be safely assumed that these error messages will occur anytime the changer is not found or accessible by the Amanda user.

Solution

Obviously, ensure that your tape changer and tape drives are correctly installed and "seen" by the OS. Next, check the permissions of the changer device and the tape device(s) associated with it. These device names, such as /dev/sg# and /dev/nst# for Linux, typically should have the following attributes

crw-rw---- 1 root disk 21, 2 2009-01-07 16:09 /dev/sg2

The Amanda user should have "disk" as its primary group or, if not, at least be included in the "disk" group. With the above device permissions, anyone in the "disk" group and thus including the Amanda user will have full read and write permissions to the device.