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<sect1 id="ch-bootable-fstab">
<title>Creating the /etc/fstab file</title>
<?dbhtml filename="fstab.html"?>

<indexterm zone="ch-bootable-fstab"><primary sortas="e-/etc/fstab">/etc/fstab</primary></indexterm>

<para>The <filename>/etc/fstab</filename> file is used by some programs to
determine where file systems are to be mounted by default, which
must be checked and in which order. Create a new file systems table like
this:</para>

<screen><userinput>cat &gt; /etc/fstab &lt;&lt; "EOF"
# Begin /etc/fstab

# file system  mount-point  fs-type  options         dump  fsck-order

/dev/<replaceable>[xxx]</replaceable>     /            <replaceable>[fff]</replaceable>    defaults        1     1
/dev/<replaceable>[yyy]</replaceable>     swap         swap     pri=1           0     0
proc           /proc        proc     defaults        0     0
sysfs          /sys         sysfs    defaults        0     0
devpts         /dev/pts     devpts   gid=4,mode=620  0     0
shm            /dev/shm     tmpfs    defaults        0     0
# End /etc/fstab
EOF</userinput></screen>

<para>Of course, replace <replaceable>[xxx]</replaceable>, <replaceable>[yyy]</replaceable>
and <replaceable>[fff]</replaceable> with the values appropriate for your system --
for example <filename class="partition">hda2</filename>, <filename class="partition">hda5</filename> and
<systemitem class="filesystem">reiserfs</systemitem>. For all the details on the six fields in this
table, see <command>man 5 fstab</command>.</para>

<para>When using a reiserfs partition, the <parameter>1 1</parameter> at the
end of the line should be replaced with <parameter>0 0</parameter>, as such a
partition does not need to be dumped or checked</para>

<para>The <filename class="directory">/dev/shm</filename> mount point for
<systemitem class="filesystem">tmpfs</systemitem> is included to
allow enabling POSIX shared memory. Your kernel must have the required support
built into it for this to work -- more about this in the next section. Please
note that currently very little software actually uses POSIX shared memory.
Therefore you can consider the <filename class="directory">/dev/shm</filename> mount point
optional. For more information, see
<filename>Documentation/filesystems/tmpfs.txt</filename> in the kernel source
tree.</para>

<para>There are other lines which you may consider adding to your
<filename>fstab</filename> file. One example is a line to use if you intend to
use USB devices:</para>

<screen> usbfs         /proc/bus/usb usbfs   devgid=14,devmode=0660 0 0 </screen>

<para>This option will of course only work if you have the
"Support for Host-side USB" and "USB device filesystem"
compiled into your kernel (not as a module).</para>

</sect1>