Anything you can do with fstab you can do with autofs, except of course that it requires the system to be up first, while fstab can bring the basic system up initially. Autofs mounts are more durable, in that they will be recreated as necessary. I'm not using the most current Gluster, so can't speak to any changes in volfiles. Your line: 127.0.0.1:/shared /var/lib/sitedata nfs defaults,_netdev 0 0 would translate to autofs as something like: /var/lib/sitedata -fstype=nfs,mountproto=tcp 127.0.0.1:/shared providing that was in "/etc/auto.nfs" and /etc/auto.master had something like: /- /etc/auto.nfs I'm taking that example from an older box which expects NFS3. IIRC on a more recent OS you have to specify also to use NFS3 for Gluster rather than NFS4. If mounting as gluster (unless some change in volfiles now negates this, works for 3.1.4 anyhow): /var/lib/sitedata -fstype=glusterfs 127.0.0.1:/shared There are other options, but that should be enough. Autofs is packages for every Linux distro AFAIK. Whit On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 at 06:58:05PM +0100, Marcus Bointon wrote: > On 16 Jan 2012, at 18:59, Whit Blauvelt wrote: > > > I find it well worth it to use autofs for anything beyond the most basic > > local mounts. That is, mount your backing store with fstab, but your gluster > > mounts (whether local or remote) with autofs. > > > > If there's an argument against autofs other than the minor setup involved, I > > don't know what it would be. > > I'd never heard of autofs before. The gluster docs on using it are > confusing/old/incomplete - current gluster doesn't seem to use volfiles > and the suggested config for local/remote server doesn't include a volume > name, nor allow you to target a single volume, only a group of them in a > folder. Are there some better docs (if this is the only way that actually > works!)? > > I read that _netdev only applies to nfs mounts, so I switched to the nfs > client (which is probably more suitable for what I'm using gluster for > anyway), however that's even worse - it hangs the whole boot process > requiring a boot into single user mode to recover it! I see this error on > the console when it hangs: > > mount.nfs: DNS resolution failed for 127.0.0.1: Name or service not known > > My line in fstab is: > > 127.0.0.1:/shared /var/lib/sitedata nfs defaults,_netdev 0 0 > > It works perfectly when mounted with mount -a after boot. > > I read in the RHEL bug tracker that nfs looking up localhost (bypassing > hosts file) is a bug, however, it seems to remain unfixed in Ubuntu Lucid. > > Marcus > -- > Marcus Bointon > Synchromedia Limited: Creators of http://www.smartmessages.net/ > UK info at hand CRM solutions > marcus at synchromedia.co.uk | http://www.synchromedia.co.uk/