[techtalk] Mounting CD's and Floppies/Using Control Panel

[GJS]

--- Laurel Fan <lf25+ at andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:
> Excerpts from linuxchix: 20-Dec-99 [techtalk] Mounting CD's
> an.. by
> GJS at yahoo.com 
> > 1) Mounting CD's and floppies in X from my user account.
> >  
> > I can mount these with the mount tool but not copy from
> either
> > or write to the floppy, not even if I su - and try it again.
> I
> > can mount both from a wterm but only if I su - first.
> However, I
> > still can't write/copy.

I managed to find an answer to the mounting problem. I was
trying to mount the floppy with "mount /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy" and
the CD with "mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom". Someone pointed out
that this doesn't work from a user account. The actual commands
that do work are "mount /dev/fd0" and "mount /dev/cdrom." For
some reason the system doesn't want the user to use the full
syntax. I don't know if this is a Mandrake thing or applicable
to all distros. 

> Note that you can't write to a cd as if it was a regular
> filesystem, even if it's a cdrw or cdr.
 
I should have been clearer. I meant I can't read to or write
from a floppy or write from a CD. I still haven't been able to
find a way to let my user account do this.

> (What do you mean by X and wterm? Are you trying to mount it
> with something other than the 'mount' command?)

I meant when I was in the X Windowing System I tried to use the
mount command from a Wterm (it's a Window Maker substitute for
an Xterm).
>   
> > The permissions on both the cd and floppy directories are
> > drwx rwx r-x    owner: root     group: root.
> 
 
> > The permissions on the mount command are -rws r-x r-w
> > owner: root     group: root.
> 
> Sure its not 
>   -rwsr-xr-x   1 root     root  ?

Yes it is. I added the spaces to make it easier to read. (Well,
it seemed like a good idea at the time :-> )   

> > The fstab file is
> > /dev/fd0   /mnt/floppy   ext2  >
sync,nosuid,users,noauto,nodev 0 0
> > /dev/cdrom   /mnt/floppy   ext2  nosuid,
users,noauto,exec,nodev,ro 0 0
> 
> For the cdrom line, the ext2 here should be iso9660.  Might
> also be a
> good idea to mount it somewhere other than /mnt/floppy, in
> case you want
> a floppy and cd mounted at the same time.

The CD line in fstab is actually /dev/cdrom  /mnt/cdrom  
iso9660 etc. I can only blame my bad typing and aging eyes.

> Floppies are also not always the ext2 filesystem.  I'm
> guessing that you
> might be trying to read a dos floppy.  Personally, I use
> mtools for
> those (which you can use as a user if you have permissions on
> /dev/fd0),
> but you can also try changing the ext2 in the floppy line to
> msdos or
> vfat. 

It was an ext2 diskette. I have them clearly marked so I don't
mix them up. For floppies, I've changed the fstab to read
/dev/fd0   /mnt/floppy   ext2   sync,nosuid,users,noauto,nodev 0
0
/dev /fd0  /mnt/a          vfat    
sync,nosuid,users,noauto,nodev 0 0

and I added /a to the /mnt directory.

By using the abbreviated mount command as I mentioned above, I
can now mount floppies (ext2 or DOS) and CD's from my user
account with either the mount tool or from a command line in a
Wterm.  Unfortunately, since I still can't figure out how to
give my user account write privileges, I can look but not touch.
And a solution to part two of my problem (why I can't use the
control panel tools even after I su from a command line in a
Wterm) still eludes me.



=====
Glen Strom
g_jay_s at yahoo.com
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