In computers, tape is an external storage medium, usually
both readable and writable, consisting of a loop of flexible celluloid-like
material that can store data in the form of electromagnetic charges that
can be read and also erased. A tape drive is the device that positions,
writes from, and reads to the tape. A tape cartridge is a protectively-encased
tape that is portable.
In early business computers, tape was a primary storage medium and computer
system operators spent a lot of time mounting and unmounting tapes for different
jobs at different times of the day. With the development of the magnetic
disk, tape became a medium for backing up (see tape backup) the large amounts
of data on mainframes. Apart from any other consideration, one drawback
of tape is that it can only be accessed by starting at the beginning and
rolling through the tape until the desired data is located. For this reason,
its main application use has been for batch processing of large amounts
of data (payroll is the classic example).
Today, tape is still widely used on mainframes for archiving and backup.
Software is provided that allows a company to easily manage automatic
backup. On personal computers, tape is also used for backup.
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