Entries in fstab file

FSTAB entries The configuration file /etc/fstab contains the necessary information to automate the process of mounting partitions. Fstab File Configuration The syntax of a fstab entry is : [Device] [Mount Point] [File System Type] [Options] [Dump] [Pass] Device By default, Ubuntu now uses UUID to identify partitions. UUID=xxx.yyy.zzz To list your devices by UUID use blkid sudo blkid Alternative ways to refer to partitions: Label : LABEL=label Network ID Samba : //server/share NFS : server:/share SSHFS : sshfs#user@server:/share Device : /dev/sdxy (not recommended) Mount point A mount point is a location on your directory tree to mount the partition. The default location is /media although you may use alternate locations such as /mnt or your home directory. You may use any name you wish for the mount point, but you must create the mount point before you mount the partition. For example : /media/windows sudo mkdir /media/windows File System Type You may either use auto or specify a file system. Auto will attempt to automatically detect the file system of the target file system and in general works well. In general auto is used for removable devices and a specific file system or network protocol for network shares. Examples: auto vfat - used for FAT partitions. ntfs, ntfs-3g - used for ntfs partitions. ext4, ext3, ext2, jfs, reiserfs, etc. udf,iso9660 - for CD/DVD. swap. Options Options are dependent on the file system. You may use "defaults" here and some typical options may include : ·         Ubuntu 8.04 and later uses relatime as default for linux native file systems. defaults = rw, suid, dev, exec, auto, nouser, and async. ntfs/vfat = permissions are set at the time of mounting the partition with umask, dmask, and fmask and can not be changed with commands such as chown or chmod. o    I advise dmask=027,fmask=137 (using umask=000 will cause all your files to be executable). More permissive options would be dmask=000,fmask=111. ·         For mounting samba shares you can specify a username and password, or better a credentials file. The credentials file contains should be owned by root.root with permissions = 0400 . Common options : sync/async - All I/O to the file system should be done (a)synchronously. auto - The filesystem can be mounted automatically (at bootup, or when mount is passed the -a option). This is really unnecessary as this is the default action of mount -a anyway. noauto - The filesystem will NOT be automatically mounted at startup, or when mount passed -a. You must explicitly mount the filesystem. dev/nodev - Interpret/Do not interpret character or block special devices on the file system. exec / noexec - Permit/Prevent the execution of binaries from the filesystem. suid/nosuid - Permit/Block the operation of suid, and sgid bits. ro - Mount read-only. rw - Mount read-write. user - Permit any user to mount the filesystem. This automatically implies noexec, nosuid,nodev unless overridden. nouser - Only permit root to mount the filesystem. This is also a default setting. defaults - Use default settings. Equivalent to rw, suid, dev, exec, auto, nouser, async. _netdev - this is a network device, mount it after bringing up the network. Only valid with fstype nfs. For specific options with specific file systems see: ·         man mount Dump This field sets whether the backup utility dump will backup file system. If set to "0" file system ignored, "1" file system is backed up. Dump is seldom used and if in doubt use 0. Pass (fsck order) Fsck order is to tell fsck what order to check the file systems, if set to "0" file system is ignored. Often a source of confusion, there are only 3 options : 0 == do not check. 1 == check this partition first. 2 == check this partition(s) next In practice, use "1" for your root partition, / and 2 for the rest. All partitions marked with a "2" are checked in sequence and you do not need to specify an order. Use "0" to disable checking the file system at boot or for network shares. You may also "tune" or set the frequency of file checks (default is every 30 mounts) but in general these checks are designed to maintain the integrity of your file system and thus you should strongly consider keeping the default settings. Examples   The contents of the file will look similar to following: # /etc/fstab: static file system information. # # <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>   proc  /proc  proc  defaults  0  0 # /dev/sda5 UUID=be35a709-c787-4198-a903-d5fdc80ab2f8  /  ext3  relatime,errors=remount-ro  0  1 # /dev/sda6 UUID=cee15eca-5b2e-48ad-9735-eae5ac14bc90  none  swap  sw  0  0   /dev/scd0  /media/cdrom0  udf,iso9660  user,noauto,exec,utf8  0  0 NOTE: These network share examples (samba, nfs, and sshfs) assume you have already set up the appropriate server. # FAT ~ Linux calls FAT file systems vfat) # /dev/hda1 UUID=12102C02102CEB83  /media/windows  vfat auto,users,uid=1000,gid=100,dmask=027,fmask=137,utf8  0  0   # NTFS ~ Use ntfs-3g for write access (rw) # /dev/hda1 UUID=12102C02102CEB83  /media/windows  ntfs-3g  auto,users,uid=1000,gid=100,dmask=027,fmask=137,utf8  0  0   # Zip Drives ~ Linux recognizes ZIP drives as sdx'''4'''   # Separate Home # /dev/sda7 UUID=413eee0c-61ff-4cb7-a299-89d12b075093  /home  ext3  nodev,nosuid,relatime  0  2   # Data partition # /dev/sda8 UUID=3f8c5321-7181-40b3-a867-9c04a6cd5f2f  /media/data  ext3  relatime,noexec  0  2   # Samba //serverX/rose  /root/Desktop/samba  cifs  credentials=/secure/samba.cifs  0  0   //server/share  /media/samba  cifs  user=user,uid=1000,gid=100  0  0 # "Server" = Samba server (by IP or name if you have an entry for the server in your hosts file # "share" = name of the shared directory # "user" = your samba user # This set up will ask for a password when mounting the samba share. If you do not want to enter a password, use a credentials file. # replace "user=user" with "credentials=/etc/samba/credentials" In the credentials file put two lines # username=user # password=password # make the file owned by root and ro by root (sudo chown root.root /etc/samba/credentials && sudo chmod 400 /etc/samba/credentials)   # NFS Server:/data /root/Desktop/nfs  nfs defaults 0 0   Server:/share  /media/nfs  nfs  rsize=8192 and wsize=8192,noexec,nosuid # "Server" = Samba server (by IP or name if you have an entry for the server in your hosts file # "share" = name of the shared directory

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