Linux @lemmy.ml gpstarman @lemmy.today 4mo ago

Mounting Folders VS Symlinks?

I have a NTFS drive for Storage, which is shared between Win 11.

I want to change the location of (or replace) ~/Downloads, ~/Music, etc..,.

Note that the link to made is between NTFS and EXT4.

I found two ways while searching.

   1.Creating **Symlinks** in `~` with target pointed to folders in NTFS drive.

   2. **Mounting** the NTFS folders **directly** to`~/Downloads`, `~/Music`, etc..,.

Which one should I do? Which one is more beneficial?

Also how to mount folders to other folders (option 2) ? (I would really appreciate a GUI way)

I know this is not that important of a thing to post on Main Linux Community, but I already asked 2 linux4noobs community, and they are empty.

This is a continuation to my previous discussion, where most of the people said,

It doesn't matter where I mount.
Mount certain folders directly into home other. (like mounting /mnt/data/music to ~/music)

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31 comments

For data like this from another filesystem I usually like to mount the entire volume somewhere private (like under /run) and then bind mount the parts I want to use into their desired locations (like /home/foo/Download, etc.)

I do this with a second ext4 drive that I use for performance sensitive storage with my primary btrfs system root. It works well, just be aware of edge cases involving containers (you may have to grant the container access to the original mount location under /run in addition to the bound path. This is definitely a gotcha when working with those paths with flatpak.)
- then bind mount the parts I want to use into their desired locations
  
  how though?
  
  This is definitely a gotcha when working with those paths with flatpak
  
  Can you explain a bit more please?
  
  how though?
  
  mount -o bind /source /target or use fstab or systemd mount units
  
  Can you explain a bit more please?
  
  Container software often needs permission for both the virtual path (wherever the bind mount is mounted to) and the source path (wherever the original is mounted from. It's not terribly complicated but it does mean fiddling with access permissions in flatpaks.
  
  You should read about bind mounts, they're fairly straightforward and there are many, many, many explanations available online
  
  Thank you.

31 comments