x-systemd.automount & CIFS shares in fstab

Question

In my /etc/fstab, I have set up a few CIFS shares to be mounted, using the template shown below:

//192.168.0.1/volume /mnt/mountpoint/ cifs auto,_netdev,x-systemd.automount,uid=1000,cache=none,user=XXX,password=XXX,workgroup=WORKGROUP 0 0

I copied the same lines to my colleague's computer (we are both running Ubuntu 12.04 LTS); however, the shares wouldn't mount on his computer until I removed the x-systemd.automount option.

As I'd like to understand the problem, could you please let me know what might have caused it?

Solution 1

Ubuntu doesn't use systemd, so x-systemd.automount won't work. I guess it is just interpreted as an invalid mount option.

If you want to have your CIFS share mounted on-demand have a look at this: http://wiki.ubuntuusers.de/Autofs

Solution 2

systemd was introduced in ubuntu 15.04.

After adding x-systemd.automount to an fstab line, you need to run:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

and then one, or both, of the following:

sudo systemctl restart remote-fs.target
sudo systemctl restart local-fs.target

only then will the automount become active.

Comments

[Admin]

I'm not a Ubunut user but I think Ubuntu moved to systemd. the x-systemd.automount should work with the latest version.

[razor7]

Hi!, you should update your answer because Ubuntu 16.04 already supports systemd, and therefore thet option x-systemd.automount will work. manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/xenial/man5/systemd.mount.5.htm‌​l

[Stuart K. Smith]

This works great. You can also add x-systemd.device-timeout=10 to your fstab line for a timeout limit.