Re: [PATCH] Minor sys_umount fix (changes semantics slightly)

Richard Gooch (rgooch@ras.ucalgary.ca)
Thu, 16 Dec 1999 11:11:55 -0700


H. Peter Anvin writes:
> Followup to: <199912152330.QAA20355@vindaloo.ras.ucalgary.ca>
> By author: Richard Gooch <rgooch@ras.ucalgary.ca>
> In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
> > >
> > > Yes, so again. Everyone agrees, I think, that mount should follow
> > > symlinks. Moreover, one expects a certain parallelism between the
> > > behaviour of mount and umount. So umount should follow symlinks
> > > until it comes to the mount point. Your problem is that the mount
> > > point used to be an ordinary directory but now is overmounted by
> > > a filesystem that has a symlink at the root.
> >
> > I really would like to see mount(8) *not* follow symlinks. If I have
> > /dev/sda2 -> /dev/scsi/host0/bus0/target0/lun0/part2
> >
> > then the current behaviour yields a huge <df> output. If I mount
> > /dev/sda2, then that's what I want to see in my <df> output.
>
> This isn't a particularly good motivation, though (if anything it
> indicates the /dev names have been made too verbose, and so noone
> will use them -- the Solaris trap)

Aside: Solaris doesn't provide an easy mechanism for you to set your
own policy.

But I don't agree with your main point. mount(8) is imposing an
unwanted policy. If I pass it a symlink as the device, I did that for
a reason. I don't want mount(8) telling me what things should look
like.

Regards,

Richard....
Permanent: rgooch@atnf.csiro.au
Current: rgooch@ras.ucalgary.ca

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