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USB external hard drive -- mounting

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  USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-28 23:30 +0200
    Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz> - 2017-08-29 01:10 +0200
      Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-29 02:20 +0200
        Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz> - 2017-08-29 03:40 +0200
          Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Frank <zuiderduin@gmx.com> - 2017-08-29 13:00 +0200
            Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-29 20:10 +0200
              Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Frank <zuiderduin@gmx.com> - 2017-08-29 21:40 +0200
      Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-29 04:40 +0200
    Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Dominique Dumont <dod38fr@gmail.com> - 2017-08-29 13:30 +0200
      Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-29 20:50 +0200
        Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Dominique Dumont <dod38fr@gmail.com> - 2017-08-29 21:10 +0200
          Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-29 21:20 +0200
          Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting "James H. H. Lampert" <jamesl@touchtonecorp.com> - 2017-08-30 00:00 +0200
      Re: USB external hard drive -- mounting Celejar <celejar@gmail.com> - 2017-09-03 04:00 +0200

#186097 — USB external hard drive -- mounting

Greetings:

I'm in the process of setting up a new server, running Debian Jessie 
8.9, replacing a Windows Server 2003 box (the same physical hardware).

One of the functions of this server is to automatically (via a script 
run from cron) back up data (mostly on other servers, via FTP and SCP) 
from other servers in the network, to a USB external hard drive.

I was pleasantly shocked when the NTFS-formatted USB drive auto-mounted 
as read/write, as soon as I plugged it in, without my having to apt-get 
anything.

So far, I've got one of these auto-backup scripts working, after a 
fashion. But there are problems: because the external drive is currently 
auto-mounted, (1) the location of the drive in the file system is 
dependent on what user was signed on to the Gnome desktop when it 
auto-mounted, and (2) if no user signs on to the Gnome desktop, it 
doesn't get mounted anywhere.

In addition, it mounts as "/media/<user>/Seagate Expansion Drive". Not 
only is this a bit of a mouthful when specifying a pathname in a script, 
and dependent on what user is signed on when it auto-mounts; it's also 
dependent on that physical drive (or another self-identifying the same), 
which would make swapping it out for a new drive potentially problematic.

And when it is unmounted, the mountpoint goes away.

I can't even determine *what* is doing the auto-mounting, and the more I 
read, the more confused I get: I see automount; I see usbmount; I see 
pmount; I've barely figured out how to see what packages are installed, 
and nothing jumps out at me as being what's auto-mounting the drive.

Can anybody advise me on how to set this thing up so that if it's 
plugged in, it will mount, to a consistent mountpoint, whether anybody's 
signed on to Gnome or not? And when it's inevitably replaced, its 
replacement will continue to do so?

--
James H. H. Lampert

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#186101

On 29/08/17 09:25, James H. H. Lampert wrote:
> Can anybody advise me on how to set this thing up so that if it's 
> plugged in, it will mount, to a consistent mountpoint, whether anybody's 
> signed on to Gnome or not?

I am not sure about the background automounting, but I get consistent 
mount points and mount settings with entries like these in /etc/fstab:

LABEL=Backup            /media/backup   ext4 
noatime,noauto,user,errors=remount-ro                       0   0
LABEL=Thumb             /media/thumb    vfat 
noatime,noauto,user,uid=1000,gid=1000,umask=007,utf8,flush  0   0

The noauto and hardcoded uid/gid might not work for you, but they could 
be a starting point. Perhaps noauto to stop automounting plus a udev 
rule? I have not tried this.

The above lines give me fixed mount points based on filesystem labels 
(LABEL), but UUID will also work. Device names are no good as they are 
by default dynamically assigned for USB storage devices.

Kind regards,

-- 
Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz>
Director
Transient Software Limited <http://transient.nz/>
New Zealand

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#186102

On 8/28/17, 4:07 PM, Ben Caradoc-Davies wrote:

> I am not sure about the background automounting, but I get consistent
> mount points and mount settings with entries like these in /etc/fstab:
>
> LABEL=Backup            /media/backup   ext4
> noatime,noauto,user,errors=remount-ro                       0   0
. . .
> The above lines give me fixed mount points based on filesystem labels
> (LABEL). . .

That got me started on an idea, even before I undertake anything with 
fstab. Thanks, Mr. Caradoc-Davies.

First, I was able to relabel the drive as a suitably generic 
"ExternalHD," and when I unplugged it and plugged it back in, it mounted 
(albeit still under a user-specific, auto-created mount point) as that 
label.

With the drive automounted, I did a "umount" on it, created a mount 
point for it (directly in /media, and available to everybody, for now, 
at least), and then did a "mount" at the new mount point. It mounted 
successfully in that user-neutral location, and is available to any 
signed-on user.

Of course, if I then unmount it, pull the plug, and plug it back in, 
without an fstab entry, it auto-mounts to a created mount point in the 
user's subdirectory of /media, but at least the mount point I created 
doesn't go bye-bye, so that's a start.

But I still need all the help I can get understanding this.

--
JHHL

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#186103

On 29/08/17 12:19, James H. H. Lampert wrote:
> First, I was able to relabel the drive as a suitably generic 
> "ExternalHD," and when I unplugged it and plugged it back in, it mounted 
> (albeit still under a user-specific, auto-created mount point) as that 
> label.
> With the drive automounted, I did a "umount" on it, created a mount 
> point for it (directly in /media, and available to everybody, for now, 
> at least), and then did a "mount" at the new mount point. It mounted 
> successfully in that user-neutral location, and is available to any 
> signed-on user.

Permissions are likely to be main problem for multiuser access. 
User-private groups, the sgid bit, and careful selection of umask may help.

> Of course, if I then unmount it, pull the plug, and plug it back in, 
> without an fstab entry, it auto-mounts to a created mount point in the 
> user's subdirectory of /media, but at least the mount point I created 
> doesn't go bye-bye, so that's a start.

Good. This is the expected behaviour for media with labels.

I have not tried this but a udev rule might be your next step:
https://www.axllent.org/docs/view/auto-mounting-usb-storage/

There is also a thing called udisks, but I have not used that either.

Kind regards,

-- 
Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz>
Director
Transient Software Limited <http://transient.nz/>
New Zealand

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#186122

Op 29-08-17 om 03:33 schreef Ben Caradoc-Davies:
> I have not tried this but a udev rule might be your next step:
> https://www.axllent.org/docs/view/auto-mounting-usb-storage/

That looks a lot more complicated than the solution I found a couple of 
years ago (in a blog posting which - unfortunately - no longer 
exists...). I also created a file in /etc/udev/rules.d/, but all it 
contains is:

ENV{ID_FS_USAGE}=="filesystem|other|crypto", 
ENV{UDISKS_FILESYSTEM_SHARED}="1"

(that's one line, in case it gets wrapped).

After  udevadm control --reload  (as root - and not --reload-rules as 
mentioned in that axllent.org doc) udisks mounts indeed appear in /media 
instead of /media/<user>.

> There is also a thing called udisks, but I have not used that either.

That's essentially what's used here.

Regards,
Frank

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#186149

On 8/29/17, 3:58 AM, Frank wrote:
> That looks a lot more complicated than the solution I found a couple of
> years ago (in a blog posting which - unfortunately - no longer
> exists...). I also created a file in /etc/udev/rules.d/, but all it
> contains is:
>
> ENV{ID_FS_USAGE}=="filesystem|other|crypto", ENV{UDISKS_FILESYSTEM_SHARED}="1"
>
> (that's one line, in case it gets wrapped).

That seems to have had no effect whatsoever: it still doesn't auto-mount 
until somebody signs on to Gnome, and when it does, it auto-mounts under 
the user's subdirectory of /media, the same as before.

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#186156

Op 29-08-17 om 20:05 schreef James H. H. Lampert:
> On 8/29/17, 3:58 AM, Frank wrote:
>> That looks a lot more complicated than the solution I found a couple of
>> years ago (in a blog posting which - unfortunately - no longer
>> exists...). I also created a file in /etc/udev/rules.d/, but all it
>> contains is:
>>
>> ENV{ID_FS_USAGE}=="filesystem|other|crypto", 
>> ENV{UDISKS_FILESYSTEM_SHARED}="1"
>>
>> (that's one line, in case it gets wrapped).
> 
> That seems to have had no effect whatsoever: it still doesn't auto-mount 
> until somebody signs on to Gnome, and when it does, it auto-mounts under 
> the user's subdirectory of /media, the same as before.

That's odd. It has worked as intended here since 2015 (Xfce, currently 
Debian Testing).

Regards,
Frank

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#186106

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On 28/08/17 18:07, Ben Caradoc-Davies wrote:
> The above lines give me fixed mount points based on filesystem labels
> (LABEL), but UUID will also work. Device names are no good as they are
> by default dynamically assigned for USB storage devices.

To complement the information given by Ben Caradoc-Davies: One can
obtain the uuid with “ls -l /dev/disk/by-uuid/”.

I can not be of more help.

Regards.

-- 
Do not eat animals, respect them as you respect people.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=how+to+(become+OR+eat)+vegan

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#186123

On Monday, 28 August 2017 14:25:15 CEST James H. H. Lampert wrote:
> Can anybody advise me on how to set this thing up so that if it's
> plugged in, it will mount, to a consistent mountpoint, whether anybody's
> signed on to Gnome or not? And when it's inevitably replaced, its
> replacement will continue to do so?

I wrote this blog a while ago for this kind of problem:
https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2016/04/24/automount-usb-devices-with-systemd/

HTH

-- 
 https://github.com/dod38fr/   -o- http://search.cpan.org/~ddumont/
http://ddumont.wordpress.com/  -o-   irc: dod at irc.debian.org

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#186150

On 8/29/17, 4:17 AM, Dominique Dumont wrote:
> I wrote this blog a while ago for this kind of problem:
> https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2016/04/24/automount-usb-devices-with-systemd/

That worked. It mounts on IPL, is available from an ssh session before 
anybody has signed on to Gnome, it mounts (after being unmounted) when 
unplugged and plugged back in, it mounts with a Gnome desktop icon, and 
it mounts as read/write, despite being NTFS. The fstab entries I came up 
with on the first try are:
> LABEL=ExternalHD /media/ExternalHD auto defaults,noatime,auto,nofail 0 2
> LABEL=ExternalHD /media/ExternalHD auto defaults,x-systemd.automount,x-systemd.device-timeout=5,noatime,noauto 0 2

One odd thing, with those two lines in fstab, and a manually-inserted 
mount point of "ExternalHD" in /media, I get this message (I had to 
restart the box about 3 or 4 times in order to write it down verbatim) 
during the IPL process, before the screen blanks and (eventually) the 
Gnome sign-on screen comes up:

> Failed to create mount unit file /run/systemd/generator/
> media-ExternalHD.mount as it already exists. Duplicate entry in
> /etc/fstab?

and also, contrary to the blog post, it doesn't, once unmounted, remount 
when one attempts to access it. None of these issues are of 
earth-shattering importance here, but I'm a bit curious about them.

--
JHHL

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#186151

On Tuesday, 29 August 2017 11:46:34 CEST James H. H. Lampert wrote:
> > LABEL=ExternalHD /media/ExternalHD auto defaults,noatime,auto,nofail 0 2
> > LABEL=ExternalHD /media/ExternalHD auto
> > defaults,x-systemd.automount,x-systemd.device-timeout=5,noatime,noauto 0
> > 2
> One odd thing, with those two lines in fstab, and a manually-inserted 
> mount point of "ExternalHD" in /media, I get this message (I had to 
> restart the box about 3 or 4 times in order to write it down verbatim) 
> during the IPL process, before the screen blanks and (eventually) the 
> 
> Gnome sign-on screen comes up:
> > Failed to create mount unit file /run/systemd/generator/
> > media-ExternalHD.mount as it already exists. Duplicate entry in
> > /etc/fstab?

Depending on the bahavior you want, you should choose one of the 2 lines, but 
not both. I believe the latter triggers the "Duplicate entry" warning .

So if you want your device to be mounted when inserted, choose the line with 
defaults,noatime,auto,nofail

If you want the device mounted when the mounted directory is accessed, choose 
the line with x-systemd.automount

HTH

-- 
 https://github.com/dod38fr/   -o- http://search.cpan.org/~ddumont/
http://ddumont.wordpress.com/  -o-   irc: dod at irc.debian.org

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#186152

On 8/29/17, 11:59 AM, Dominique Dumont wrote:
> Depending on the bahavior you want, you should choose one of the 2 lines, but
> not both. I believe the latter triggers the "Duplicate entry" warning .
>
> So if you want your device to be mounted when inserted, choose the line with
> defaults,noatime,auto,nofail
>
> If you want the device mounted when the mounted directory is accessed, choose
> the line with x-systemd.automount

I see. Ok. That seems reasonable, although even on re-reading the blog 
entry, it still isn't clear (at least to one like me who doesn't often 
dig around in the guts of Linux), that it's an "either/or" situation, 
without your explanation above.

Thanks for getting back to me. In my case, it's the first version.

--
JHHL

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#186162

Ok. As it stands now, I have only the "case 1" fstab entry in place, and 
after this line of the backup script:
> cd /media/ExternalHD/Backups
I've added these lines:
> if [ "$?" = "1" ]; then
>   mount /media/ExternalHD
>   cd /media/ExternalHD/Backups
> fi

which (at least in theory) should mount the external drive if it's 
connected but not mounted.

(And if it doesn't mount, then the backup gets built in the home 
directory instead, which is no big deal, since it's backing up something 
from a separate physical box.)

Tonight, I'll leave ExternalHD connected but unmounted, and tomorrow 
morning, I'll see what will have happened.

Thanks.

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#186340

On Tue, 29 Aug 2017 13:17:31 +0200
Dominique Dumont <dod38fr@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Monday, 28 August 2017 14:25:15 CEST James H. H. Lampert wrote:
> > Can anybody advise me on how to set this thing up so that if it's
> > plugged in, it will mount, to a consistent mountpoint, whether anybody's
> > signed on to Gnome or not? And when it's inevitably replaced, its
> > replacement will continue to do so?
> 
> I wrote this blog a while ago for this kind of problem:
> https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2016/04/24/automount-usb-devices-with-systemd/

Thanks for this. Following your post, I added a line like this to
fstab:

/dev/mapper/mydrive	/media/mydrive	ext4	defaults,user,nofail	0       0

It seems to work fine for automounting, but the problem is that it
adds 90 seconds to the boot when the external drive is not present. The
'nofail' option allows the boot to eventually continue, but it only
does so after a 90 second timeout is reached.

The Arch wiki suggests adding "x-systemd.device-timeout=1" to solve
this, but it seems like a bit of a kludge, and it will still add 1
second for each external drive that has an entry in fstab - not an
ideal solution.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/fstab#External_devices

Celejar

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