can't mount ext2fs

[Robert Meyer]

--- "S. Lawton " <green_man at bluefrognet.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> On 9 Jun 2002, at 17:29, Charles Rishel wrote:
> 
> > Did you try specifying the filesystem type?
> > 
> > mount -t ext2 /dev/fd0 /mount/floppy
> > 
> > Chaz®
> > 
> > 
> I tried it, told me that only root could issue that command. 
> [first was a no such directory error- on my box it's /mnt/floppy] 
> 
> opened a root console and tried it - it mounted fine, but once 
> mounted there was already a lost+found  directory there [?normal ?].
> I could then write and read as a normal user, but had to umount as 
> root. Even full of data it wouln't mount from the desktop. 

That's about right.  Generically, you don't want users mounting and
unmounting filesystems.  That's how bad things happen.  Having
said that, if you modify /etc/fstab and make the entry for the floppy
look like this:
/dev/fd0	/mnt/floppy  auto  usermount
you should be able to mount it as a user.  Having said that, most
newer versions of Mandrake support an automounting system
called 'supermount'.  It automatically mounts floppies and cdroms
at the time that you try to access them.  You can also cobble
'autofs' into mounting and unmounting them for you.  Having
said that, why would you absolutely want floppies to be in ext[23]
format?  DOS formatted floppies work well for most things,
including backing up files.  The only thing that winds up missing
is the permissions of the files.  You can mitigate that by using
'tar' to back up to a tar file on the floppy.

One thing I learned a long time ago: "If you can't think of at least
three ways to do something, you're not thinking hard enough." :-)
> 
> I have two floppy drives, would it be possible to have one for DOS 
> disks and one for linux ? 
yes, make the second one in /etc/fstab look like the first one except
that you change 'vfat' to 'ext2' and change the mount point to
/mnt/floppy1 (don't forget to create the directory).  If you add
'usermount' to the options in /etc/fstab, you will be able to mount
the file system as a normal user.
 
Hope this helps...

Cheers!

Bob

=====
Bob Meyer
Knightwing Communications, Inc.
36 Cayuga Blvd
Depew, NY 14043
Phone: 716-308-8931 or 716-681-0076
Meyer_RM at Yahoo.com

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