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Nine-Track Tapes and the IRS!? (1Sep94) (from KPNO, NOAO Newsletter No. 39, 1 September 1994) What do nine-track tapes and the Internal Revenue Service have in common? What they have in common is 15 April. We all know what that date means with respect to the IRS, but what does it have to do with nine-track tapes? Read on... 15 April 1995, is the day selected by the Central Computer Services Department at NOAO-Tucson to recycle the remaining nine-track tapes held in their stacks for visitors. On that day all nine-track tapes (including T-tapes used on the mountain) that belong to non-NOAO staff members will be recycled or discarded. There will be NO warnings or e-mail reminders! If you have any data stored at NOAO that you are concerned about please contact Jeannette Barnes jbarnes@noao.edu immediately so arrangements can be made for acquiring the data. We have no resources for copying tapes so please take this into consideration if you have data stored at NOAO that you need to preserve. On 15 April, CCS officially brings to an end the last phase of the backup service that it provided to the astronomical community through the nine-track tape media. As a reminder, on 15 August 1994, the nine-track T-tapes were discontinued as a backup medium on the mountain, and backup tapes in general are no longer held for visitors at the downtown offices. We can not stress enough to observers to make their own backup copies of their data - the safety of the data is the observer's responsibility! The "Save-the-Bits" project will continue to archive raw data automatically at the telescopes for archival purposes, and will replace the functionality provided by the now-outdated nine-track tape technology. Jeannette Barnes, Bruce Bohannan, Steve Grandi
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