Shfs

Shfs is a simple and easy to use Linux kernel module which allows you to mount remote filesystems using a plain shell (ssh) connection. When using shfs, you can access all remote files just like the local ones, only the access is governed through the transport security of ssh.

Note: The FUSE-based SSHFS is much more widely used, as shfs has not been updated since 2004.

Installation

Install the shfs-utils package.

Warning: In order to use shfs it needs to be installed and configured on the client side, not on the server side, server only needs to have working sshd running.

Configuration

If you want to use shfsmount as mortal user, you will have to chmod +s /usr/bin/shfsmount and chmod + /usr/bin/shfsumount. However it is much more comfortable to put your mount options into /etc/fstab. For example:

remoteuser@Server:/data   /mnt/data   shfs    rw,noauto,uid=localuser,persistent   0       0
remoteuser@Server:/crap   /mnt/crap   shfs    rw,noauto,uid=localuser,persistent   0       0
remoteuser@Server:/backup /mnt/backup shfs    rw,noauto,uid=localuser,persistent   0       0
remoteuser@Server:/home   /mnt/home   shfs    rw,noauto,uid=localuser,persistent   0       0

You can Using SSH Keys to not type a password.

Maybe you need to complete your option list with port=<portnumber>.

Add an entry in fstab

To add an entry for an shfs volume in your fstab, add a line of the format:

userid@remoteMachine:/remoteDirectory /home/userid/remoteDirectory shfs rw,user,noauto 0 0

See also

• SSHFS
• Ubuntu Forums
• Reference
• Another reference