Description of problem: With 'man mount' one can read this: ..... -t vfstype The argument following the -t is used to indicate the file sys- tem type. The file system types which are currently supported include: adfs, affs, autofs, coda, coherent, cramfs, debugfs, devpts, efs, ext, ext2, ext3, hfs, hpfs, ..... ..... The further lecture of this page indicates that this is not 'autofs' (which does not have anything to do with things provided by 'autofs' package) but 'auto' and that indeed is used, say, in /etc/fstab. Also 'hpfs' file system does not seem to be there; but there is, and it works, 'hfsplus' not mentioned by this documentation. This is a file system used by OSX. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): util-linux-2.13-0.5.pre4
There's "autofs" filesystem: # cat /proc/filesystems | grep autofs nodev autofs
> There's "autofs" filesystem: Yes, you are right. For some reasons when I was looking at /prof/filesystems on rawhide I missed it (or it was not there at that moment) and I assumed that it is gone. Still 'man mount' describing '-t auto' behaviour says .... All of the filesystem types listed there will be tried, except for those that are labeled "nodev" ... and this particular one happens to be "nodev"; while 'auto' type does not show up on a list of acceptable ones but is only mentioned later on in sentences like "The auto type may be useful for user-mounted floppies". Is there any situation when it makes sense to use 'mount -t autofs ...' in an explicit way? Yes, I know that autofs daemon is using that type.
The mount uses libblkid for filesystem detection in case "-t auto" or in case you run it without "-t". It tries filesystems from /proc/filesystems when the all others possibilities failed (= very exotic filesystem). The "autofs" is really for automounter only. I think the man page is useful enough. Closing.