accessing-file-storage-ubuntu.md

copyright	lastupdated	keywords	subcollection	content-type	services	account-plan	completion-time
years 2014, 2025	2025-03-21	File Storage for Classic, NFS, mounting File Storage, mounting storage on Ubuntu,	FileStorage	tutorial		paid	1h

{{site.data.keyword.attribute-definition-list}}

Mounting {{site.data.keyword.filestorage_short}} on Ubuntu

{: #mountingUbuntu} {: toc-content-type="tutorial"} {: toc-services=""} {: toc-completion-time="1h"}

Use these instructions to connect an Ubuntu Linux®-based {{site.data.keyword.cloud}} Compute instance to a Network File System (NFS) share. For more information about how to order {{site.data.keyword.filestorage_full}}, see the Getting started tutorial. {: shortdesc}

Before you begin, make sure that the host that is to access the {{site.data.keyword.filestorage_short}} volume is authorized. For more information, see Authorizing the host in the console{: ui}Authorizing the host from the CLI{: cli}Authorizing the host with Terraform{: terraform}. {: requirement}

Mounting the {{site.data.keyword.filestorage_short}} share

{: #mountUbuntu}

1. Update and upgrade the distribution:

   apt update && apt upgrade

   {: pre}

2. Install the required tools.

   apt-get install nfs-common

   {: pre}

3. Create a /mnt/nfs directory.

   mkdir -p /mnt/nfs

   {: pre}

4. Restart your instance:

   reboot

   {: pre}

5. Mount the remote share.

   mount -t nfs -o <options> <host:/mount_point> /mnt

   Example for storage_as_a_service volumes.

   #mount -t nfs -o nfsvers=3 fsf-wdc0403a-fz.service.softlayer.com:/IBM02SEV1414935_66/data01 /mnt
   

   Example for enterprise volumes.

   # mount -t nfs -o nfsvers=3 nfshou0201d-fz.service.softlayer.com:/IBM01SEV1414935_2 /mnt
   

   The mount point information can be obtained from the {{site.data.keyword.filestorage_short}} Details page in the console, with an API call - SoftLayer_Network_Storage::getNetworkMountAddress(), or by looking at the ibm_storage_file resource in Terraform. {: tip}

6. Verify that the mount was successful by using the disk file system command.

   # df -h
   Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
   /dev/xvda2  25G  1.4G  22G    6%   /
   /tmpfs     1.9G     0 1.9G    0%   /dev/shm
   /dev/xvda1 97M    51M  42M   55%
   

7. Go to the mount point, and read/write files.

   # touch /mnt/test
   # ls -la /mnt
   total 12
   drwxr-xr-x   2 nobody nobody 4096 Sep 8 15:52 .
   dr-xr-xr-x. 22 root   root   4096 Sep 8 14:30 ..
   -rw-r--r--   1 nobody nobody    0 Sep 8 15:52 test
   

8. Make the configuration persistent by editing the file systems table (/etc/fstab). Add the remote share to the list of entries that are automatically mounted on startup:

   sudo nano /etc/fstab

   Add a line with the following syntax to the end of the file.

   (hostname):/(mount_point) /mnt nfs_version defaults 0 0

   Example

   nfsdal1301a.service.softlayer.com:/IBM01SV278685_7 /mnt nfsvers=3 defaults 0 0
   

9. Verify that the configuration file has no errors.

   # mount -fav

   {: pre}

   If the command completes with no errors, your setup is complete.

   If you're using NFS 4.1, add sec=sys to the mount command to prevent file ownership issues. {: tip}

Managing user permissions to the content of the mounted file share

{: #ubuntu-user-group-permissions}

As a system administrator, you can manage the access to data on the mounted file storage volume. After the file share is mounted, you can refine access control by using the chown and chmod commands to assign read, write, and execute permissions to individual users and groups. For more information, see the Ubuntu Server documentation about User management{: external}.

Unmounting the file system

{: #umountUbuntu}

To unmount any currently mounted file system on your host, run the umount command with disk name or mount point name.

umount /dev/sdb

{: pre}

umount /mnt

{: pre}