[TriLUG] NFS client on Laptop configuration question, and an Ubuntu tip

[Rick DeNatale]

This is probably exposing my lack of knowledge.

I have a directory on my workstation server on my home network which
is exported to NFS.  On my laptops /etc/fstab I've got an entry for
this calling out the server by name, and with noauto specified.

The server name is in a subdomain which is inside my NAT firewall, and
only visible inside the lan via my local dns server.

I'd like to have this directory auto mounted on boot when it's
available (i.e. when I'm at home).

How is this normally configured. If I change fstab to change noauto to
auto and add the bg option how will this behave when I boot when I'm
on the road and can't see the server?  Will NFS continue to try to
mount in face of dns errors?  Thinking ahead, if and when I set up VPN
will such a configuration be able to automount the nfs share after
boot when a vpn connection is established?

As for the second part of the subject line, while I was digging around
for the answer before posting this, I discovered that Ubuntu does not
install portmap by default.  This explained why manually mounting this
share on the laptop was taking so bloody long.  I'm still not sure how
NFS mounts work when portmap is not installed on the client.

In any event, Ubuntu machines which are nfs clients should have the
portmap package installed. There's also a nfs-common package which
pre-reqs portmap and also adds some nfs command line tools like
nfsstats.

--
Rick DeNatale

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