linuxexpert-practice-labs/labs/rhcsa/6-3-autofs

RHCSA 6.3: autofs

Mounting NFS exports on demand with an indirect map, a wildcard map for home directories, and a direct map.

Before you start

The lab adds a second machine, server (10.99.0.2), running an NFS server that exports to the lab network 10.99.0.0/24:

• server:/exports/share, with a file readme.txt in it;
• server:/exports/homes, with a home directory for each of alice and bob (/exports/homes/alice and /exports/homes/bob, each with a welcome.txt).

server shares this VM's files, so you can see /exports here too, but mount it from server. The lab creates users alice and bob (password Lab-Pass-1) and sets alice's home directory to /rhome/alice. autofs isn't installed.

Tasks

1. Make server:/exports/share mount on demand at /shares/data, unmounting after 60 seconds unused.
2. Make each user's home mount on demand from server:/exports/homes/USER at /rhome/USER, with one map line, so that su - alice lands in /rhome/alice.
3. Make the same share, server:/exports/share, mount on demand at /mnt/direct with a direct map, still after a reboot.

Hints

• dnf install autofs, systemctl enable --now autofs; a file in /etc/auto.master.d/ ending in .autofs, and a map file; systemctl reload autofs.
• /shares /etc/auto.shares --timeout=60, and a data line in the map.
• * and & in the map line. The homes are private and root is squashed on the share, so look inside them as their owner: su - alice.
• /- in the master map; full paths in a direct map.
• ls, findmnt, automount -m.