1AUTOFS(8) System Manager's Manual AUTOFS(8)
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6 autofs - Service control for the automounter
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9 If a SysV init script system is being used:
10 /etc/rc.d/init.d/autofs start|stop|restart|reload|status
11 or if the systemd init system is being used:
13 systemctl start|stop|restart|reload|status autofs.service
14
16 autofs controls the operation of the automount(8) daemon(s) running on
17 the Linux system. Usually autofs is invoked at system boot time with
18 the start parameter and at shutdown time with the stop parameter. Ser‐
19 vice control actions can also be manually invoked by the system admin‐
20 istrator to shut down, restart, reload or obtain service status.
21
23 autofs will consult a configuration file /etc/auto.master (see
24 auto.master(5)) by default to find mount points on the system. For each
25 of those mount points automount(8) will mount and start a thread, with
26 the appropriate parameters, to manage the mount point.
27 /etc/rc.d/init.d/autofs reload or systemctl autofs.service reload will
29 check the current auto.master map against the current automount managed
30 mounts. It will terminate those daemons or threads (depending on autofs
31 version) whose entries have been removed, re-read the automount maps
32 for entries that have changed and start new daemons or threads for
33 entries that have been added.
34 If an indirect map is modified then the change will become effective
36 immediately. If an indirect map uses the browse option, the master map
37 contains direct mount maps or the auto.master map is modified then the
38 autofs service control reload action must be rerun to activate the
39 changes.
40 However, if a map entry has offsets and is currently in use the offset
42 mounts cannot be updated due to potential mount dependencies. In this
43 case the map entry offsets will not be updated until after the map
44 entry has expired.
45 /etc/rc.d/init.d/autofs status or systemctl autofs.service status will
47 display the status of, automount(8), running or not. When using the
48 systemd init system the status output includes somewhat more informa‐
49 tion related to the service status.
50 systemctl(1) has more functions than the actions mentioned here, see
52 systemctl(1) for more information.
53
55 automount(8), autofs(5), autofs.conf(5), auto.master(5), aut‐
56 ofs_ldap_auth.conf(5), systemctl(1).
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59 This manual page was written by Christoph Lameter <chris@waterf.org>,
60 for the Debian GNU/Linux system. Edited by H. Peter Anvin <hpa@trans‐
61 meta.com> and Ian Kent <raven@themaw.net>.
62 9 Sep 1997 AUTOFS(8)