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Systems & Data Center · Advanced

autofs

A Linux service that mounts filesystems automatically on access and unmounts them after a period of inactivity.

Definition

autofs uses a master map (/etc/auto.master) that points to map files describing mount points, commonly for NFS home directories. On-demand mounting avoids boot delays when network shares are unavailable.

Example

/etc/auto.master: /shares /etc/auto.shares, and /etc/auto.shares: projects -rw nas01:/exports/projects.

Exam tip

RHCSA tasks often require configuring autofs to mount NFS-based user home directories on demand.

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