AMRMTAPE(8)

📦
version 3.5.4 · 8 versions
, in ubuntu stonking

✨ AMRMTAPE ✨

okay so this is amrmtape, and it lives in section 8 — System Administration Commands, iykyk. it's the little tool that lets you tell Amanda "bestie that tape? yeah, she's gone, we don't know her anymore." 🫶

🌸 NAME

amrmtape — remove a tape from the Amanda database

💅 SYNOPSIS

amrmtape [--changer changer-name] [--cleanup] [--dryrun] [-n] [--erase]
         [--external-copy] [--keep-label] [--list-retention]
         [--list-no-retention] [--remove-no-retention] [--quiet] [-q]
         [--verbose] [-v] config [label]*

🦋 DESCRIPTION

amrmtape invalidates the contents of an existing backup tape in the configuration database. Think of it as the glow-up-your-life recovery move 💖 — it exists for when a genuinely good backup gets wrecked, whether by faulty hardware or by user error (yes, the situation where the tape gets eaten by the drive, or just fully overwritten). no cap, it happens.

For all the deets about Amanda itself, go read the amanda(8) man page. periodt.

🎀 OPTIONS

  • --changer changer-name — tells it which changer to use when erasing label. pick your girl 💅
  • --cleanup — remove logs and indexes associated with label. otherwise they just sit there chilling until the next run of amdump.
  • --dryrun, -n — generate new tapelist(5) and database files with label removed, but leave them in /tmp and do not touch the original copies. a lil rehearsal, no commitment 🧚
  • --erase — attempt to erase the data contained on the volume with the given label. this requires that Amanda be able to find that volume using the tape changer. not every Amanda device supports erasure, and heads up: the erasure is not "secure" — the data can most likely be recovered by someone with the right tools. so like… it's gone, but not gone gone. 🙈
  • --external-copy — the volume is erased but the label is kept in the tapelist and the log file. you must use this function if you manually made a copy of the volume that you can manually restore. you should also mark the label as noreuse.
  • --keep-label — do not remove label from the tapelist. the volume become like a new labelled tape and can be reused by any storage using the same tape-pool. it's giving rebrand 💅
  • --list-retention — list all labels that are required for the policy of each storage.
  • --list-no-retention — list all labels that are not required for the policy of each storage. these are the volumes that can be reused.
  • --remove-no-retention — remove all labels that are not required for the policy of each storage. useful with --keep-label and/or --erase.
  • --verbose, -v — list backups of hosts and disks that are being discarded. enabled by default.
  • --quiet, -q — opposite of -v.

🔥 EXAMPLE

remove tape labeled DAILY034 and DAILY035 from the DailySet1 configuration:

# amrmtape DailySet1 DAILY034 DAILY035

ate. no crumbs left. 💀✨

⭐ SEE ALSO

The Amanda Wiki: : http://wiki.zmanda.com/

👑 AUTHORS

  • Adrian T. Filipi-Martin <atf3r@cs.virginia.edu>
  • Stefan G. Weichinger <sgw@amanda.org>

and that's the whole vibe, bestie — this was Amanda 3.5.4, dated 08/26/2026. go forth and manage your tapes responsibly 🎀💖✨

📦 where this page comes from