--- /dev/null
+
+README for the SCSI media changer driver
+========================================
+
+This is a driver for SCSI Medium Changer devices, which are listed
+with "Type: Medium Changer" in /proc/scsi/scsi.
+
+This is for *real* Jukeboxes. It is *not* supported to work with
+common small CD-ROM changers, neither one-lun-per-slot SCSI changers
+nor IDE drives.
+
+Userland tools available from here:
+ http://linux.bytesex.org/misc/changer.html
+
+
+General Information
+-------------------
+
+First some words about how changers work: A changer has 2 (possibly
+more) SCSI ID's. One for the changer device which controls the robot,
+and one for the device which actually reads and writes the data. The
+later may be anything, a MOD, a CD-ROM, a tape or whatever. For the
+changer device this is a "don't care", he *only* shuffles around the
+media, nothing else.
+
+
+The SCSI changer model is complex, compared to - for example - IDE-CD
+changers. But it allows to handle nearly all possible cases. It knows
+4 different types of changer elements:
+
+ media transport - this one shuffles around the media, i.e. the
+ transport arm. Also known as "picker".
+ storage - a slot which can hold a media.
+ import/export - the same as above, but is accessable from outside,
+ i.e. there the operator (you !) can use this to
+ fill in and remove media from the changer.
+ Sometimes named "mailslot".
+ data transfer - this is the device which reads/writes, i.e. the
+ CD-ROM / Tape / whatever drive.
+
+None of these is limited to one: A huge Jukebox could have slots for
+123 CD-ROM's, 5 CD-ROM readers (and therefore 6 SCSI ID's: the changer
+and each CD-ROM) and 2 transport arms. No problem to handle.
+
+
+How it is implemented
+---------------------
+
+I implemented the driver as character device driver with a NetBSD-like
+ioctl interface. Just grabbed NetBSD's header file and one of the
+other linux SCSI device drivers as starting point. The interface
+should be source code compatible with NetBSD. So if there is any
+software (anybody knows ???) which supports a BSDish changer driver,
+it should work with this driver too.
+
+Over time a few more ioctls where added, volume tag support for example
+wasn't covered by the NetBSD ioctl API.
+
+
+Current State
+-------------
+
+Support for more than one transport arm is not implemented yet (and
+nobody asked for it so far...).
+
+I test and use the driver myself with a 35 slot cdrom jukebox from
+Grundig. I got some reports telling it works ok with tape autoloaders
+(Exabyte, HP and DEC). Some People use this driver with amanda. It
+works fine with small (11 slots) and a huge (4 MOs, 88 slots)
+magneto-optical Jukebox. Probably with lots of other changers too, most
+(but not all :-) people mail me only if it does *not* work...
+
+I don't have any device lists, neither black-list nor white-list. Thus
+it is quite useless to ask me whenever a specific device is supported or
+not. In theory every changer device which supports the SCSI-2 media
+changer command set should work out-of-the-box with this driver. If it
+doesn't, it is a bug. Either within the driver or within the firmware
+of the changer device.
+
+
+Using it
+--------
+
+This is a character device with major number is 86, so use
+"mknod /dev/sch0 c 86 0" to create the special file for the driver.
+
+If the module finds the changer, it prints some messages about the
+device [ try "dmesg" if you don't see anything ] and should show up in
+/proc/devices. If not.... some changers use ID ? / LUN 0 for the
+device and ID ? / LUN 1 for the robot mechanism. But Linux does *not*
+look for LUN's other than 0 as default, becauce there are to many
+broken devices. So you can try:
+
+ 1) echo "scsi add-single-device 0 0 ID 1" > /proc/scsi/scsi
+ (replace ID with the SCSI-ID of the device)
+ 2) boot the kernel with "max_scsi_luns=1" on the command line
+ (append="max_scsi_luns=1" in lilo.conf should do the trick)
+
+
+Trouble?
+--------
+
+If you insmod the driver with "insmod debug=1", it will be verbose and
+prints a lot of stuff to the syslog. Compiling the kernel with
+CONFIG_SCSI_CONSTANTS=y improves the quality of the error messages alot
+because the kernel will translate the error codes into human-readable
+strings then.
+
+You can display these messages with the dmesg command (or check the
+logfiles). If you email me some question becauce of a problem with the
+driver, please include these messages.
+
+
+Insmod options
+--------------
+
+debug=0/1
+ Enable debug messages (see above, default: 0).
+
+verbose=0/1
+ Be verbose (default: 1).
+
+init=0/1
+ Send INITIALIZE ELEMENT STATUS command to the changer
+ at insmod time (default: 1).
+
+timeout_init=<seconds>
+ timeout for the INITIALIZE ELEMENT STATUS command
+ (default: 3600).
+
+timeout_move=<seconds>
+ timeout for all other commands (default: 120).
+
+dt_id=<id1>,<id2>,...
+dt_lun=<lun1>,<lun2>,...
+ These two allow to specify the SCSI ID and LUN for the data
+ transfer elements. You likely don't need this as the jukebox
+ should provide this information. But some devices don't ...
+
+vendor_firsts=
+vendor_counts=
+vendor_labels=
+ These insmod options can be used to tell the driver that there
+ are some vendor-specific element types. Grundig for example
+ does this. Some jukeboxes have a printer to label fresh burned
+ CDs, which is addressed as element 0xc000 (type 5). To tell the
+ driver about this vendor-specific element, use this:
+ $ insmod ch \
+ vendor_firsts=0xc000 \
+ vendor_counts=1 \
+ vendor_labels=printer
+ All three insmod options accept up to four comma-separated
+ values, this way you can configure the element types 5-8.
+ You likely need the SCSI specs for the device in question to
+ find the correct values as they are not covered by the SCSI-2
+ standard.
+
+
+Credits
+-------
+
+I wrote this driver using the famous mailing-patches-around-the-world
+method. With (more or less) help from:
+
+ Daniel Moehwald <moehwald@hdg.de>
+ Dane Jasper <dane@sonic.net>
+ R. Scott Bailey <sbailey@dsddi.eds.com>
+ Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>
+
+Special thanks go to
+ Martin Kuehne <martin.kuehne@bnbt.de>
+for a old, second-hand (but full functional) cdrom jukebox which I use
+to develop/test driver and tools now.
+
+Have fun,
+
+ Gerd
+
+--
+Gerd Knorr <kraxel@bytesex.org>
git://git.onelab.eu / linux-2.6.git / blobdiff