Description of problem: If a fstab entry has noauto option fsck should either ignore the entry or allow the device node to not exist.q Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): e2fsprogs-1.40.8 How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. create fstab entry with noauto option and a LABEL=xxx device entry 2. ensure that the underlying device doesn't exist n(eg disconnected usb drive) 3. boot Actual results: 1. fsck.ext3: Unable to resolve LABEL=xxx Expected results: 1. fsck should ignore any entry with noauto if devive cannot be resolved Additional info: What does noauto mean? It means noauto!
Well, according to the fstab man page: Common for all types of file system are the options ‘‘noauto’’ (do not mount when "mount -a" is given, e.g., at boot time), ... but it does not mention fsck in the context of noauto. However, The sixth field, (fs_passno), is used by the fsck(8) program to determine the order in which filesystem checks are done at reboot time. The root filesystem should be specified with a fs_passno of 1, and other filesystems should have a fs_passno of 2. Filesystems within a drive will be checked sequentially, but filesystems on different drives will be checked at the same time to utilize parallelism available in the hardware. If the sixth field is not present or zero, a value of zero is returned and fsck will assume that the filesystem does not need to be checked. So, if you don't want it fsck'd at boot time, shouldn't you set fs_passno to 0? -Eric
It would make a lot more sense if "noauto" meant that nothing what-so-ever happened automatically - including fsck. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a mount that is set to "noauto" to be automatically fsck'ed at boot time - regardless of the setting of fs_passno. After all, isn't a fsck essentially a prelude to a mount? And if there it is not going to be automatically mounted then why fsck it?
I agree that those are all interesting questions, and the behavior you see is a bit strange, but the fstab format is a pretty time-honored standard - and there are separate parameters for controlling auto-mount and auto-fsck. I can poke around for some other opinions, but it seems to me that if you have an fs_passno field of "1" in your fstab, you're asking for a fsck pass, regardless of whether you plan to mount it. "noauto" + "fs_passno == 1" is, I think, a misconfiguration, or at least a strange one. Really, I think your best course of action is to just exchange your "1" for a "0" :) -Eric
Sorry, I'm going to close this. fs_passno = 1 means: check this filesystem. I think this is just a misconfiguration.