With Celerra NDMP the data format for dump and tar is the same - the difference us mainly how the fs is walked (depth-first vs. breadth-first)  VBB is very different - it's a block copy like a dd  Rainer
I have been working on getting backups of a Celerra written to a virtual tape library on a UNIX machine using NDMP.  According to all the documentation I've read, I should be able to pass an environment variable TYPE to specify the format of the dump.  Further, the Celerra should accept the values of "dump" and "tar".  I know the variable is getting passed, but it seems to always be ignored:  1310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) < Backup type: dump >1310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) Name: BASE_DATE Value: 01310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) Name: FILESYSTEM Value: /jh-cifs1310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) Name: HIST Value: y1310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) Name: TYPE Value: dump1310745654: NDMP: 4: Session 021 (thread ndmp021) tape service is on a remote side, CALLER_ADDRESS 0x11b94f1.  Note the backup type is dump.  As the backup finishes, this line is shown by server_log:  1310745654: NDMP: 6: Thread nasa00 server_archive: emctar vol 1, 5 files, 0 bytes read, 272731 bytes written  It looks like server_archive is always invoked to use the emctar format, whether I pass dump or tar.  Further, the doc for server_archive says that other formats, including ustar (which is compatible with POSIX-standard tar implementations), are supported.  To me, server_archive looks a *lot* like the pax command, so I'm hoping that I can get an NDMP backup sent from the Celerra in a format other than EMC's own emctar.  Does anyone know if that's possible?  Thanks!  Joe H.
NDMP backup TYPE variable ignored?