In my experience what protocol to use depends on what client you're trying to use.

So for sharing video to the xbox minidlna. If I needed to use windows, then samba.

NFS should work well with Linux hosts with static IP addresses. I think user based authentication requires getting kerberos working.

If you want to use a username/password for logging in then samba or webdav. Samba should be faster than webdav. If you want unix style owner, group, and permissions you need to enable some extensions.

But if you're trying to connect two linux boxes, NFS really should work well. Are they getting the same IPs?

Quoting: denyasisSo, SAMBA, WedDAVS, , FTP, whatever else (not NFS).... Which is superior for a simple Linux file server?

I've grown tired of my crappy NFS implementation and would like switch to something else.

To be more specific, I have an NFS server that just runs a simple, local, file storage for movies, music, games, backups, etc. etc. I'd like to replace it with a fairly simple fire-and-forget file server that integrates with the file system and most importantly, fails gracefully when the local server is not available (traveling).

So, What do you use? Why?

Thx

I'd recommend nfs or sshfs. Other than those, i also used samba, but that was way slower than nfs, also had some weird problems (disconnects while copying for example). I think the simplest one is sshfs if you have ssh access on your storage machine, that's what i use now with my remote HDD.

Thanks dudes!


My server already has servers for streaming media (emby and LMS), so I'm just looking for something that can hold and serve files filesystem-style.

I like NFS, and it was super easy to setup for the server and client. I'm just tired of my laptop freezing up for 10 to 30 minutes whenever I do anything file related and the NFS server is inaccessible. (Probably because I'm horrible at configuring systemD)

I don't travel often, but it's embarrassing and extremely frustrating.

I'll have to check out sshfs as it seems well liked, never thought of that. I'm familiar with ssh, so hopefully it's not a huge leap.

You might try nfs mounts with the "soft" option.

https://serverfault.com/questions/56588/unmount-a-nfs-mount-where-the-nfs-server-has-disappeared

The default is hard and it'll keep trying until the server comes back.

Also maybe look at https://nextcloud.com/? You can have configurable background file synchronization or access the shared file system via webdav.

Thanks for the idea for soft. I've been experimenting with solutions for a few years and was under the impression that soft increased the risk of file corruption. From the article, it says intr is similar. I'm currently using intr, but will try soft.

I've also tried setting the systemd timeouts to 10 sec, but to no avail.

I actually do have nextcloud running on my server (and love it). My server is an industrial itx box from 2008, so running things through nextcloud's web interface is like watching cold molasses go up hill. I did get a gift of a new motherboard combo and memory, so I'll have to report back one I do the upgrade next week.

Thx for the ideas!

Quoting: GuestThat certainly does not happen with sshfs (but I don’t have systemd). At worst the mountpoint becomes empty… I don’t use a service for sshfs, and I remount it manually if I need to reboot the server.

Yeah, I'll admit my old desktop used sysvinit and never had issues(but I also never carried it out of the house), which makes me convinced it's systemd, but I'm more inclined to think it's me not knowing what I'm doing, than actually something wrong with systemd or NFS.

It's nice to know that sshfs appears to fail gracefully. I'd assume webdavs probably does the same, being web-based. I'll probably start with those as I already have the server side components in place.

I'm glad I'll have some reading for when I travel home tonight.

Also fun fact, for reasons unknown, my phone is insisting it autocorrect systemd as Satan.

Quoting: denyasisI actually do have nextcloud running on my server (and love it). My server is an industrial itx box from 2008, so running things through nextcloud's web interface is like watching cold molasses go up hill.

For what it's worth, I've been running Seafile (Community Edition) on a rather lightweight vps for work (behind nginx) and it feels lighter and syncing seems more robust compared to nextcloud. It doesn't have some of the bells and whistles though.

Hey all,

wanted to thank you ask for the suggestions and let you know what I ended up doing (for now).

I generally like NFS, so I tried some experiments. Stan, I liked your ping script for sshfs and a found one for NFS on the archwiki. I implemented it using a systemd timer and it seems to work. I found it was generating a ton of syslog output and tagged that down to the systemd idle timeout for my mounts (basically systemd was now configured to fight itself). I changed the script to only unmount (since systemd handles the automount and timeout).

I tested it out while taking apart my server for about 2 hours. No freeze on shutdown! A slight freeze when opening the file manager, but not obnoxiously long like before.

Only weird thing is Thunar. My device and mount timeout ate set to 10 sec, so I'd figure a maximum freeze of 20 sec. I can see in the logs when I open Thunar, it tries to mount the shares, but the freeze time isn't consistent. Sometimes 20sec, sometimes minutes (I got up to 5). Pcmanfm is fine. I forgot to test how long it freezes if I click on a share.

On the server side, I completed my upgrade, replacing the 2008-9 Intel atom 330, with an AMD a8-5545. I also upgraded from 2gb of ddr2 ram (the Intel board's max), to 8gb of ddr3. It's so quiet! And fast! Itx has come a long way in 10 years! The only original parts left on that old server are the power supply and the 16gb sata ssd (summer project).

Now that I have a speedy server, I'm gonna try out sshfs and webdavs on my next day off. Seafile looks cool too. I'll admit I'm probably too invested in Nextcloud to switch out right, but I'm gonna keep it in mind should I start having problems with Nextcloud.

Thanks again for the suggestions! Happy New year!

I know I'm late to the party and your problem is solved, but I'd also like to recommend own/nextCloud. It runs as a regular cloud service, syncing a folder in your home but, at least in Gnome, if you set up your account, it'll show a tab in the left column of the file manager that works just like a network share. From my experience, it works very well.

Edit: in other environments, which may not have ownCloud/nextCloud integration, it's enough to do "connect to server" in the file browser using davs:// protocol. You'll need to supply the correct directory, but it's all explained in the online documentation.

Hey;

Thanks for the info. I do have a Nextcloud implementation on my server to access stuff over the web. I did my server upgrade and found that Nextcloud runs much much faster.

I took an old 2005 laptop that I use in my office for websurfing and tried out davs and sshfs. Its wireless and only a few feet from the server. Using PCMANFM to connect to the server with davs and sshfs. sshfs was super fast, worked with my ssh keys, and was pretty responsive. My only issue with it was that it mounted the servers root directory (Most likely user error on my end). Davs was a little disappointing. It was not as responsive, although moving files around seemed to be just fine. I also got some weird keyring pop-up error, when I entered the password, it gave an error saying it could not mount the share and then it mounted it anyway.

I'll probably try to mount them in fstab in the next day or so and see what it looks like.

Thanks