The file /etc/fstab (it stands for “filesystem table”) contains
descriptions of filesystems that you mount often. These filesystems
can then be mounted with a shorter command, such as mount /cdrom.
You can also configure filesystems to mount automatically when the
system boots. You’ll probably want to mount all of your hard disk
filesystems when you boot, so Debian automatically adds entries to
fstab to do this for you.
Look at this file now by typing more /etc/fstab. It will have two or
more entries that were configured automatically when you installed
the system. It probably looks something like this:
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
# /
# / #
# / #
# <file system> <mount point> <type> <options> #<dump > <pass>
#
/dev/hda1 / ext2 defaults 0 1
/
/dev/hda3 none swap sw 0 0
/
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/hda5 /tmp ext2 defaults 0 2
/
/dev/hda6 /home ext2 defaults 0 2
/
/dev/hda7 /usr ext2 defaults 0 2
/
/dev/hdc /cdrom iso9660 ro,noauto 0 0
/
/dev/fd0 /floppy auto noauto,sync 0 0
/
/
/
/
/
The first column lists the device the filesystem resides on. The
second lists the mount point, the third indicates the filesystem
type. The line beginning by proc is a special filesystem. Notice
that the swap partition (/dev/hda3 in the example) has no mount
point, so the mount point column contains none.
The last three columns may require some explanation.
The fifth column is used by the dump utility to decide when to back
up the filesystem. In most cases, you can put 0 here.
The sixth column is used by fsck to decide in what order to check
filesystems when you boot the system. The root filesystem should
have a 1 in this field, filesystems that don’t need to be checked
(such as the swap partition) should have a 0, and all other
filesystems should have a 2. It’s worth noting that the swap
partition isn’t exactly a filesystem in the sense that it does not
contain files and directories but is just used by the Linux kernel
as secondary memory. However, for historical reasons, the swap
partitions are still listed in the same file as the filesystems.
Column four contains one or more options to use when mounting the
filesystem. You can check the mount manpage for a summary; see
section 5.1 on page [*].