automatically mount network drive - 10.04 LTS

[Avi Schwartz]

On 02/14/2011 07:58 PM, Arnaud G wrote:

> I am back to the drawing board. Below is what I need to accomplish. I 
> have been looking around, trying different solutions, experimenting 
> but so far I am not satisfied with the result I got.
>
> We are migrating people, in my university, to Ubuntu 10.04 LTS. On the 
> "desktop" side (approx 500 users) LTSP will be used. It works. So far 
> so good.
> By default everything is saved under their "Documents" folder.
>
> My problem is about the laptop users. They will have 10.04 LTS 
> installed on their machine.  When they use their laptop their work is 
> saved by default in their "Documents" folder. So far everything is good.
> I would like to synchronize their laptop "Documents" folder to their 
> network drive "Documents" folder. I can use rsync for that once their 
> network drive is "mounted". I could use something similar to that in 
> their .bashrc or write a little script
>
> if [ ! -f ~/homework/.lock ]; then
>         /usr/bin/smbmount //ldap/username ./homework -o noperm
> fi
>
> That would be fine but one thing is they should not have to open a 
> bash, type anything or double click something. The reason is that they 
> will never synchronize their folder if they have to do something. I 
> know, I know, they are academics :)
> Then we would be held responsible for any loss or whatever went wrong.
>
> If I put in fstab the mount instruction and they are not connected to 
> the network, it will "freeze" until it times out. Can be a pain and a 
> source of complaints. XP was better :(
>
> Basically what I am looking for as a solution is this:
>
> a) When the machine gets an ip from the network at work, their network 
> drive should be automatically mounted. A mount point will be created 
> on their default install.
>
> b) When the laptop gets an ip that is not from work, the "mount 
> instruction" should immediately be ignored.
>
> c) If the machine is already up and running, but was not connected to 
> the network, and they connect it to the network, the drive should be 
> mounted automatically. At this point I would be able to sync both 
> directories (local and network "Documents"). I will use a cron job for 
> that. Maybe not the best solution but I have limited knowledge, so I 
> use what I know.
>
> I am thinking there might be a possibility to accomplish what I 
> described above with pam_auth. If there are authenticated to the 
> network, the drive is mounted, if not it is not mounted. I am not sure 
> though if it can be done that way. I still have some reading to do, 
> but before I continue, I would like to know if
>
> 1) it's make sense to do it the way I described it
>
> 2) if there is a better solution
>
> 3) what people do in that situation.

Maybe there are better ways, but in the past I used to install scripts 
in the /etc/network directory? This directory has 4 sub-directories, 
if-down.d,  if-post-down.d,  if-pre-up.d, and  if-up.d in which you can 
install scripts to be executed when the network connection is brought up 
and/or down.  Also, if you use the network manager then there is the 
directory /etc/NetworkManager/dispatcher.d in which I used in the past 
to run a script that detected network interface changes and acted upon. 
That may help you automate the process.

Avi
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