mt

mt [option] operation [count] [arguments]

Control a magnetic tape drive used to back up or restore system data. The version of the mt command documented here is mt-st, which includes support for the st driver for SCSI tape devices. The operation argument determines what action will be taken, and, unless the -f or -t option is used, the action is applied to the default tape drive named in the TAPE environment variable. The count argument determines how many times the operation is to be repeated. If not specified, it defaults to 1. Some operations take one or more arguments other than a count, as noted in the descriptions below.