It is intended to be a reliable and transparent handler for multivolume archives, superior to both afio(1) and tar(1) .
In addition, it provides the capability of double-buffering to keep your tape drive streaming continuously, therefor greatly extending the life of both your tapes and your drive.
One of its most most advanced features is, that it automatically determines the length of your tapes. You can write multiple volume archives to a series of tapes having different lengths. You can also use MULTIBUF to automatically change tapes if you have an automated tape changer. 10.1
The information in this section is only of interest, if you want to understand how it works or use it as a standalone program for some other purpose. You do not need to understand this to use KBACKUP , as the use of MULTIBUF is fully automated. However, if you are concerned about compatibility, the data format used or restoring files without KBACKUP , continue to read this section.