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AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsDavid Berman, William M. Dyer, A. David Erpelding, Wayne I. Imaino, Ronald R. Labby
Estimating the term…
A spring-like clip for a spool of tape, one end of the clip being attached to one end of the tape, and another end of the clip having an engagement feature that allows the clip to be pulled from the spool. The clip is configured to curve around the spool to hold the tape in place. In one general embodiment, a product includes a reel, a tape coupled to the reel, and a spring-like clip coupled to a free end of the tape. The clip is selectively positionable in a wrapped position where the clip wraps around a portion of the tape when the tape is wound onto the reel, thereby holding the portion of the tape in place on the reel. Systems for using various types of such products are presented, and generally include a tape drive configured for reading data from tape stored on such products.
A product, comprising:
A spring-like clip for a spool of tape, one end of the clip being attached to one end of the tape, and another end of the clip having an engagement feature that allows the clip to be pulled from the spool, wherein the clip is configured to curve around the spool to hold the tape in place wherein the spring-like clip is resiliently deformable, wherein the spring-like clip has a rounded profile along a longitudinal length thereof when decoupled from the spool and in the absence of any external forces, wherein the length of the clip between a free end thereof and an end thereof coupled to the tape is between 50% and 100% of the circumference of an outer surface of the tape when the tape is wound completely on the reel, wherein a free end of the clip has a bent portion for enabling optical detection of the bent portion by an optical detector.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.