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Is there a command to mount a folder from one partition to my main partition?

Example of what I'd like to do, which obviously doesn't work:

mount /media/tc1/folder /home/dvad/home

If not by using a command, is there another way I can do this?

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2 Answers 2

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178

Yes but before I go that far, couldn't you just symlink?

ln -s /media/tc1/folder ~/home

This link is just a file that is interpreted. It is automatically permanent (until you delete the file).

Failing that you can use mount as you described but the syntax is slightly different:

mount --bind /media/tc1/folder /home/dvad/home

This is not permanent at all, and will be nuked by a restart. If you want it to persist, you'll need something in your /etc/fstab like this:

/media/tc1/folder    /home/dvad/home    none    bind

If you're trying a mount and it's not working, you should make sure that the block-level device is mounted. You can't directly mount a subdirectory of a partition without first mounting the partition.

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  • 3
    Thanks for the fstab trick. I use mount --bind to "link" folders into a users home folder that I expose to my friends (symlink doesn't play well with chroot) and now I don't have to re-do it or run a script that does it after each reboot. Not sure why I didn't think of using fstab before as I use it for all my media drives. Thanks again!
    – JoshStrange
    Oct 31, 2014 at 15:31
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    mount --bind source destination
    – Michel Samia
    Nov 27, 2014 at 14:03
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    mount --bind is useful in chroot'ed environment - since symlinks doesn't work there.
    – abyss.7
    Nov 20, 2015 at 10:46
  • I'm trying a mount and it's not working, and I made sure the partition is mounted. What might be going on?
    – Marc.2377
    Jul 3, 2016 at 11:08
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    @GabrielStaples Nope. man fstab will tell you the final two fields Defaults to zero (don't {dump,fsck}) if not present.
    – Oli ♦
    Apr 7, 2017 at 8:59
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An alternative to mount:

bindfs -n /media/tc1/folder /home/dvad/home

Requires sudo apt-install bindfs.

Like with mount, this will be a (non-permanent) actual mount point, i.e. for instance version-control systems will not only track it as a symbolic reference, but see the files “in there”. However like for ln -s, you do not need superuser permissions for bindfs as you would for mount.

Unmount with fusermount -u /home/dvad/home (or by restarting).

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