How to enable user to mount USB enclosure

[satimis]

Hi folks,

I have a HD mounted on USB enclosure. Please advise how to allow user=satimis to mount the USB enclosure (USB drive). Tks

The HD has 2 partitions, /dev/sda1 and /dev/sda2
corresponding mount points /media/disk /media/disk-1

# ls -l / | grep media

drwxr-xr-x  4 root root  4096 Oct 20 08:41 media

# ls -l /media

total 8
drwxrwxrwx 2 satimis satimis 4096 Oct 16 16:14 disk
drwxrwxrwx 2 satimis satimis 4096 Oct 16 13:33 disk-1

I need to copy directories and files from /home/satimis on the HD preserving their owner and permission.

FS on /dev/sda1 msdos
FS on /dev/sda2 ext3
FS on gentoo ext3

Can I copy directories/files on /dev/sda1? It is running on msdos fs.


TIA


B.R.
satimis

[apoorv_khurasia]

first edit your fstab and add this line or modify the existing line for usb to look something like this

/dev/sda1               /mnt/usb        subfs       fs=auto,rw,users         0 0

Next add yourself in the usb group. Enjoy!!!

[satimis]

Hi apoorv_khurasia,

Tks for your advice.

Next add yourself in the usb group.

$ cat /etc/group | grep usb
No printout.

What shall I add on /etc/group? TIA

B.R.
satimis

[apoorv_khurasia]

I have two solutions coming to my mind right now.

1. Go ahead with the first part (the fstab one) and do check what device (sda, sda1, sdb???) is your usb. If you can mount-umount your drive without being root than all's done....

2. If you can do so as root (which I believe you should be able to do) then try this. emerge sudo (if its already emerged then go ahead) and create a group called usb (as root)

user # \su -
Password:
root # groupadd usb

Then edit the sudo file and allow all users in the usb group to mount/umount usb drives.

How to do this?

Make a script called mountusb and place it in /sbin. The contents of the script should be

#!/bin/sh
mount /mnt/usb

Do this now

root # chmod +x /sbin/mountusb
root # visudo

The last command above will open a file (/etc/sudoers) if sudo is correctly installed on your system. Add this line to the end of the file:

%usb    <your-machine-hostname>=/sbin/mountusb

Mine looks like this: (my machine is turing.iitd.ac.in)

%usb turing=/sbin/mountusb

Now add yourself to usb group:

root # moduser -G usb <user-name>

Re-login as a normal user now (kill -1 -1 and then login) and try mounting usb drive. Let me know if it works/fails.

Good Luck!!!