Cleaning fstab

[Owdy]

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# <file system> <mount point>  <type> <options>    <dump> <pass>
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
# /dev/sda1
UUID=e26f464a-4b8a-49e6-a9e5-117be482809f / ext3 nouser,defaults,errors=remount-ro,noatime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 1
# /dev/sda6
UUID=8a52bd0b-217c-479b-877a-e497c4436173 /home ext3 nouser,defaults,noatime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 2
# /dev/sda5
UUID=852418a7-206d-44fd-ad2b-224ca3d21a79 /jako ext3 nouser,defaults,acl,noatime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 2
# /dev/sda2
UUID=064be2c4-4f5f-4fce-b102-bd764e5d8580 /roipetta ext3 nouser,defaults,noatime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 2
# /dev/sda3
UUID=1fb7341c-6a26-45ab-99e9-5b1410cf3315 none swap sw 0 0
/dev/hda /media/cdrom0 udf,iso9660 user,noauto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 0

Is there anything i could clean from that file? Example there are 'defaults' and also all those things are listed too. Can i make it simplyer and better? Suggestions?

[aysiu]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I wouldn't touch /etc/fstab unless you know what you're doing.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

[Owdy]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I wouldn't touch /etc/fstab unless you know what you're doing.

Thats why im asking here

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

Cleaner file, thats all

edit: does 'noatime' really make my machine faster?

[aysiu]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I'm still confused as to what you're trying to accomplish. What do you mean by "cleaner"?

In the meantime, you may want to check this out:
http://www.tuxfiles.org/linuxhelp/fstab.html

[Owdy]

Re: Cleaning fstab

Im trying to understand why there are double things etc. 'defaults' covers rw, suid, dev, exec, auto, nouser, and async, right? So why there are first 'defaults' and then 'rw,dev,exec' etc. Why just not 'defaults'?

How about that other thing, does 'noatime' really make my machine faster?

[aysiu]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I don't think having redundant items hurts you at all, but if you want to take those out, by all means do so.

As for noatime, this link seems to indicate you might experience "significant performance improvements," but you won't really know until you try.

If you're going to mess around with your /etc/fstab, though, you should 1) always have a backup copy you can return to and 2) have a live CD you can use to restore your /etc/fstab with because if you mess it up, you won't be able to log in at all to restore the backup copy.

sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.backup

[Owdy]

Re: Cleaning fstab

As for noatime, this link seems to indicate you might experience "significant performance improvements," but you won't really know until you try.

Is there any reason to keep it as atime?

[aysiu]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I have no idea. I'd never even heard of atime or noatime before reading this thread, and I've been using Ubuntu/Kubuntu for a year and a half.

As I said before, back up your /etc/fstab and make sure you have a live CD handy, and you can test it out... see if there's any difference.

[Owdy]

Re: Cleaning fstab

I have no idea. I'd never even heard of atime or noatime before reading this thread, and I've been using Ubuntu/Kubuntu for a year and a half.

Ill have to ask around.

[askrieger]

Re: Cleaning fstab

As you may have noticed the recent move to generating persistent filenames via UUID has made the fstab really feelthy, so trying to clean up /etc/fstab by hand to make it more human readable is now a futile exercise. Not to mention that UUIDs are a security hole (if they are really universal).

All of which has very little to do with your questions. Personally, I NEVER use "defaults" in an fstab entry (because I'm a control freak). There are some rules that I can't remember, but you can look it up ("man mount"), about whether specific entries before or after "defaults", changes the value or not. Moreover, the defaults are a function of the file system in question. I believe (I may be even wronger than usual) that the performance gains from "noatime" are fairly minimal because modern linux kernels do a lot more caching, especially of inodes, than they used to do. Therefore, any reference to the pros and cons of "atime" or "noatime" that's more than a couple of years old is probably obsolete.