02/22/80  Volume naming conventions

     The MR8.0 RCP Resource Management package enforces slightly different con-
ventions in the naming of volumes.  The most visible differences will be appar-
ent to some users of tape volumes.


     Under previous releases, there was a loosely-defined correspondence be-
tween the "name" of a volume and its "slot number".  The slot number specified
a location from which the operator could find the desired volume.  The name of
a volume was specified by what appeared on the internal magnetic label, if any.
In the majority of cases, where these are identical, operations on these vol-
umes will continue to be performed exactly as before.  However, the manner in
which a user requests a volume will most likely change for all volumes that:
1) Contain a "volume identifier" on an internal magnetic label, that differs
significantly from the slot number; or
2) Have been habitually requested under a generic name encompassing an informal
class of physical volumes, e.g., "plotter", "dump", and so on.


Magnetic label/slot mismatch:
     Under Resource Management, the name of a volume is now defined by its slot
number, which is a unique, per-site quantity.  Users of tapes whose magnetic
label contains a "volume identifier" that differs from the slot number (now
also the name) may be accustomed, due to site policy, to requesting these de-
vices by volume identifier, optionally identifying the real slot number as a
comment to the operator; e.g.,
     Smith1 -comment "slot 000123"
or
     Smith1,*slot_000123
Users requesting these tapes under Resource Management must now request these
tapes by slot number.  Discrepancies between the magnetic label and the
user-requested name will be handled by operator volume-authentication proce-
dures and user-ring I/O modules.


Generic names:
     Resource Management allows only one generic name: "scratch".  The comment
facility of the I/O module in use may be used to cause the same effect as a re-
quest via generic name, e.g.:
     scratch,*plotter
or
     scratch -comment plotter
In addition, system tape I/O modules have been modified to display to the user
the actual name of the tape in use when a scratch volume is mounted.


I/O Module modification:
     For tape volumes, the tape_ibm_ and tape_ansi_ I/O modules have been modi-
fied to provide greater leniency in cases where the volume identifier recorded
on the VOL1 label does not match the user-supplied volume name.  Formerly,
these modules would refuse to operate on such tapes.  With MR8.0, the user will
now be queried as to whether the attachment should proceed as requested.


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Historical Background

This edition of the Multics software materials and documentation is provided and donated
to Massachusetts Institute of Technology by Group BULL including BULL HN Information Systems Inc. 
as a contribution to computer science knowledge.  
This donation is made also to give evidence of the common contributions of Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Bell Laboratories, General Electric, Honeywell Information Systems Inc., Honeywell BULL Inc., Groupe BULL
and BULL HN Information Systems Inc. to the development of this operating system. 
Multics development was initiated by Massachusetts Institute of Technology Project MAC (1963-1970),
renamed the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence in the mid 1970s, under the leadership
of Professor Fernando Jose Corbato. Users consider that Multics provided the best software architecture 
for managing computer hardware properly and for executing programs. Many subsequent operating systems 
incorporated Multics principles.
Multics was distributed in 1975 to 2000 by Group Bull in Europe , and in the U.S. by Bull HN Information Systems Inc., 
as successor in interest by change in name only to Honeywell Bull Inc. and Honeywell Information Systems Inc. .

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Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute these programs and their documentation for any purpose and without
fee is hereby granted,provided that the below copyright notice and historical background appear in all copies
and that both the copyright notice and historical background and this permission notice appear in supporting
documentation, and that the names of MIT, HIS, BULL or BULL HN not be used in advertising or publicity pertaining
to distribution of the programs without specific prior written permission.
    Copyright 1972 by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Honeywell Information Systems Inc.
    Copyright 2006 by BULL HN Information Systems Inc.
    Copyright 2006 by Bull SAS
    All Rights Reserved