On Fri, 2008-04-04 at 08:17 +1030, Tim wrote: > Mikkel L. Ellertson: > >> Is there a difference in how mount handles things if the drive is > >> missing if you use the LABEL= form? I know in the past, the system > >> would not boot normally if you used the device form and the drive > >> was not there. > > Patrick O'Callaghan: > > It's a while since I've tried it without the LABEL= form. Remember that > > Fedora now recommends using labels (since F7 I think). > > Since FC7, at least. I'm using them on a FC6 box, and I'm fairly > certain that wasn't just because I felt like it. > > > With the LABEL= form I get: > > > > # umount /xtra > > -- now turn off external drive > > # mount /xtra > > mount: special device LABEL=/xtra does not exist > > I'd expect labels to be better, too. But both ways return an immediate > error then tried on the command line. If you're trying to mount a > device, the OS expects that device to be there. If you try to mount a > label, the OS is going to look through the currently available devices > to see if it can find it. I wonder if the boot routines handle "drive > doesn't exist" errors differently? Only if fstab has them set to run fsck at boot time, in which case the boot will pause and offer to drop you to a Shell (I just tried it). And of course if the drive has stuff the boot process needs then it's going to fail. Otherwise it should carry on regardless. poc
