External harddrive [solved]

[theYinYeti]

But to be honnest, this is a guess only, because Mandriva should handle this drive by default, and I'm afraid the above file just does what Mandriva already does, and does better...

[kilimanjaro]

Aloha

 

I installed the ntfs-3g package, and suddenly I could access the drive. I am still having problems with it. It says it is read only, and I have tried changing in in the control center, but it doesn't seem to work. I don't know how to change the fstab manually, cna someone help me with that?

[kilimanjaro]

Aloha

 

I installed the ntfs-3g package, and suddenly I could access the drive. I am still having problems with it. It says it is read only, and I have tried changing in in the control center, but it doesn't seem to work. I don't know how to change the fstab manually, can someone help me with that?

[theYinYeti]

I had the same problem with a ntfs3g-mounted drive. I solved this by changing /etc/fstab, on the line referencing this drive. I set those options:

umask=0000,allow_other

 

Yves.

[kilimanjaro]

I don't know how to do that other than in the control center, and it doesn't seem to work for this drive.

[theYinYeti]

Oh sorry, I realize my previous post is not usable for a hot-plugged drive. You can try what I suggested in this post but replace the contents of the file with:

<deviceinfo version="0.2">
 <device>
<match key="volume.partition.type" string="0x07">
  <match key="block.is_volume" bool="true">
	<append key="volume.mount.valid_options" type="strlist">allow_other</append>
	<merge key="volume.policy.mount_option.umask=0000" type="bool">true</merge>
	<merge key="volume.policy.mount_option.allow_other" type="bool">true</merge>
  </match>
</match>
 </device>
</deviceinfo>

 

Yves.

[kilimanjaro]

What will this do?

[scarecrow]

What will this do?

It tells hal to use ntfs-3g to mount removable ntfs partitions (instead of the read-only kernel module) and allow users to mount/umount them.

[kilimanjaro]

So I tried that, and it didn't seem to have any effect, what did I do wrong?

 

"I don't know NTFS-related issues very well, but it seems to me you could create a /etc/hal/fdi/policy/something.fdi, containing:

 

<deviceinfo version="0.2">
 <device>
<match key="volume.partition.type" string="0x07">
  <match key="block.is_volume" bool="true">
	<append key="volume.mount.valid_options" type="strlist">allow_other</append>
	<merge key="volume.policy.mount_option.umask=0000" type="bool">true</merge>
	<merge key="volume.policy.mount_option.allow_other" type="bool">true</merge>
  </match>
</match>
 </device>
</deviceinfo>

 

Then as root:

 

# service messagebus restart
# service haldaemon restart"

[theYinYeti]

You did nothing wrong. Unfortunately, to my own dismay, I've recently discovered that HAL settings are broadly overrided by a number of applications, thus rendering those kinds of tweakings partly unpredictable and often useless.

 

I have no more ideas. I hope you'll get help from someone else. I'll keep an eye on this because I'm interested too.

 

Yves.

[kilimanjaro]

So, I still can't write to the drive, does anyone have any ideas?

[theYinYeti]

I do have an idea, after all :)

I think, I'm not sure, that your problem would be easier to solve if you had a line in /etc/fstab for your drive. The /dev/sda1 device may be many things beside this particular drive BUT nowadays, it is possible to specify a drive UID instead of the device!

 

1/ Plug your drive in, and execute:

find /dev/disk/by-uuid/ -lname "*sda1" -printf "%P\n"

This will give you the UUID of your partition. Let it be "D841-58F1" for the example; you'll have to change with the right value because that's the UUID for my USB key.

 

2/ In a terminal window, login as root (su - root), then execute:

cp -a /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.backup; gedit /etc/fstab &

BE CAREFUL because this will edit an important system file: be sure not to change the existing lines.

In this file, remove the line beginning with "/dev/sda1" if there is one, then add the following line at the end of the file:

UUID=D841-58F1 /media/hd ntfs-3g umask=0000,user,nls=utf8,noatime,allow_other,noauto 0 0

 

3/ Create the mount point (as root), unless it already exists:

mkdir /media/hd

 

4/ Make sure the /etc/fuse.conf file exists, and if necessary create it. Ensure there's the following line in this file:

user_allow_other

Just this word alone on its line; this will tell fuse that users can mount fuse partitions.

 

5/ In Mandriva Control Center (aka "mcc"), go into System > Users setup, and add your user to the "fuse" group; this will tell fuse that you are a user allowed to mount fuse partitions.

 

Now you should be able to mount the drive when it is connected (or maybe it will auto-mount?), and read and write to it.

 

Yves.

[theYinYeti]

Does it work ? I'm very curious

[AussieJohn]

The Windows partition is likely still shown as NTFS in the Mandriva system.

For ntfs-3g to work you must go into MCC .....................Local Disks................Manage Disk Partitions.

 

Click on the Windows Partition/Drive............click on Unmount.......then on Mountpoint and clear it.

 

Now click on Type and look for NTFS-3G and click on it. Once again click on Mountpoint and restore the name you had for the Windows Partition, click Ok.

 

Click on Mount then on Done.

 

You need to reboot. You should be now able to do what you want.

 

Installing ntfs-3g is not the so;ution, it is only half of the solution.

 

Cheers. John.

[kilimanjaro]

Aloha Everyone

 

Sorry I haven't answered for awhile. I had something go very wrong and my system stopped working. Terminals won't work, I can't open the control center. I think I did something very wrong. I am also trying to get IBM Lotus Notes Client working and I think I messed something up there. SO, I am going to reinstall my system and then try to get everything going.

 

kili

Edited February 1, 2008 by kilimanjaro