Ubuntu Manpage: automount - manage autofs mount points

Provided by: autofs_5.1.2-1ubuntu3.2_amd64

NAME

       automount - manage autofs mount points

SYNOPSIS

       automount [options] [master_map]

DESCRIPTION

       The  automount  program  is  used  to  manage  mount  points for autofs, the inlined Linux
       automounter.  automount works by reading the auto.master(5) map and sets up  mount  points
       for  each entry in the master map allowing them to be automatically mounted when accessed.
       The file systems are then automatically umounted after a period of inactivity.

OPTIONS

-h, --help
Print brief help on program usage.

-p, --pid-file
Write the pid of the daemon to the specified file.

-t <seconds>, --timeout <seconds>
Set the global minimum timeout, in seconds, until directories are unmounted. The
default is 10 minutes. Setting the timeout to zero disables umounts completely.
The internal program default is 10 minutes, but the default installed configuration
overrides this and sets the timeout to 5 minutes to be consistent with earlier
autofs releases.

-n <seconds>, --negative-timeout <seconds>
Set the default timeout for caching failed key lookups. The default is 60 seconds.

-v, --verbose
Enables logging of general status and progress messages for all autofs managed
mounts.

-d, --debug
Enables logging of general status and progress messages as well as debugging
messages for all autofs managed mounts.

-Dvariable=value, --define variable=value
Define a global macro substitution variable. Global definitions are over-ridden
macro definitions of the same name specified in mount entries.

-f, --foreground
Run the daemon in the foreground and log to stderr instead of syslog."

-r, --random-multimount-selection
Enables the use of ramdom selection when choosing a host from a list of replicated
servers.

-m, --dumpmaps [<map type> <map name>]
With no parameters, list information about the configured automounter maps, then
exit.

If the dumpmaps option is given and is followed by two parameters, "<map type> <map
name>" then simple "<key, value>" pairs that would be read in by a map read are
printed to stdout if the given map type and map name are found in the map
configuration.

If the map is an LDAP map and there is more than one map of same name in different
base dns only the first map encountered by autofs will be listed. Similarly, if the
map is a file map and there is more than one map of the same name in different
directories, only the first map encountered will be listed.

If the map type is an old style multi-map and any one of the map names in the
multi-map entry matches the given map name the entries that would be used by autofs
for the whole multi-map will be listed.

-O, --global-options
Allows the specification of global mount options used for all master map entries.
These options will either replace or be appened to options given in a master map
entry depending on the APPEND_OPTIONS configuration setting.

-V, --version
Display the version number, then exit.

-l, --set-log-priority priority path [path,...]
Set the daemon log priority to the specified value. Valid values include the
numbers 0-7, or the strings emerg, alert, crit, err, warning, notice, info, or
debug. Log level debug will log everything, log levels info, warn (or warning), or
notice with enable the daemon verbose logging. Any other level will set basic
logging. Note that enabling debug or verbose logging in the autofs global
configuration will override dynamic log level changes. For example, if verbose
logging is set in the configuration then attempting to set logging to basic
logging, by using alert, crit, err or emerg won't stop the verbose logging.
However, setting logging to debug will lead to everything (debug logging) being
logged witch can then also be disabled, returning the daemon to verbose logging.
This option can be specified to change the logging priority of an already running
automount process.

The path argument corresponds to the automounted path name as specified in the master map.

-C, --dont-check-daemon
Don't check if the daemon is currently running (see NOTES).

-F, --force
Force an unlink umount of existing mounts under autofs managed mount points during
startup. This can cause problems for processes with working directories within
these mounts (see NOTES).

ARGUMENTS

       automount takes one optional argument, the name of the master map to use.

       master_map
              Location for autofs master map that defines autofs managed  mount  points  and  the
              mount maps they will use. The default is auto.master.

NOTES

If the automount daemon catches a USR1 signal, it will umount all currently unused autofs
managed mounted file systems and continue running (forced expire). If it catches the TERM
signal it will umount all unused autofs managed mounted file systems and exit if there are
no remaining busy file systems. If autofs has been compiled with the option to ignore busy
mounts on exit it will exit leaving any busy mounts in place otherwise busy file systems
will not be umounted and autofs will not exit. Alternatively, if autofs has been compiled
with the option to enable forced shutdown then a USR2 signal to the daemon will cause all
mounts to be umounted and any busy mounts to be forcibly umounted, including autofs mount
point directories (summary execution). Note that the forced umount is an unlink operation
and the actual umount will not happen in the kernel until active file handles are
released. The daemon also responds to a HUP signal which triggers an update of the maps
for each mount point.

If any autofs mount point directories are busy when the daemon is sent an exit signal the
daemon will not exit. The exception to this is if autofs has been built with configure
options to either ignore busy mounts at exit or force umount at exit. If the ignore busy
mounts at exit option is used the filesystems will be left in a catatonic (non-functional)
state and can be manually umounted when they become unused. If the force umount at exit
option is used the filesystems will be umounted but the mount will not be released by the
kernel until they are no longer in use by the processes that held them busy. If automount
managed filesystems are found mounted when autofs is started they will be recovered unless
they are no longer present in the map in which case they need to umounted manually.

If the option to disable the check to see if the daemon is already running is used be
aware that autofs currently may not function correctly for certain types of automount
maps. The mounts of the separate daemons might interfere with one another. The
implications of running multiple daemon instances needs to be checked and tested before we
can say this is supported.

If the option to force an unlink of mounts at startup is used then processes whose working
directory is within unlinked automounted directories will not get the correct pwd from the
system. This is because, after the mount is unlinked from the mount tree, anything that
needs to walk back up the mount tree to construct a path, such as getcwd(2) and the proc
filesystem /proc/<pid>/cwd, cannot work because the point from which the path is
constructed has been detached from the mount tree.

BUGS

       Don't know, I've fixed everything I know about.

       The documentation could be better.

       Please  report  other  bugs along with a detailed description to <autofs@vger.kernel.org>.
       Visit http://vger.kernel.org/vger-lists.html#autofs for information about the list.

AUTHOR

       H. Peter Anvin <hpa@transmeta.com> and Ian Kent <raven@themaw.net>.

                                           12 Apr 2006                               AUTOMOUNT(8)