How to Access a Pen Drive in Linux

A pen drive, also referred as a "jumpdrive" or "USB flash drive," is a USB flash memory device. It is commonly used to quickly transfer various data between computers that often have different operating systems. The Windows operating system usually automatically detects a USB flash drive, and it becomes acceptable instantly. However, in Linux, a pen drive needs to be mounted as a file system.

Things You'll Need

• Superuser (root) password

Instructions

1. Right-click the mouse on the Desktop and choose "Open Terminal" from the pop-up menu.

2. Type "su" and press "Enter." Then type your root password and press "Enter" to get administrator (root) privileges.

3. Type "cd /mnt" and press "Enter."

4. Type "mkdir usb" and press "Enter" to create a USB directory.

5. Type "cd /etc" and press "Enter."

6. Type "cp fstab fstab_original" and press "Enter" to back up the original fstab file.

7. 

   Type "nedit fstab" and press "Enter" to edit the fstab file.

8. 

   Add the following line at the end of the fstab file in the nedit editor:
   /dev/sdc1 /mnt/usb auto noauto,user,rw 0 0

9. Click "File" > "Save" to save the file. Then click "File" > "Exit" to exit nedit.

10. Type "exit" and press "Enter" to exit the root shell.
    Note: Steps 2 to 10 are only a one-time procedure. Once they are done, always start from the Step 11.

11. Insert a pen drive into a USB port.

12. Type "mount /mnt/usb" and press "Enter."

13. Type "cd /mnt/usb" and press "Enter." Type "ls" and press "Enter" to list the pen drive content.

14. Click on the USB folder icon, which should appear on the Desktop, to access the drive content.

15. Unmount a pen drive by closing all files and folders that were used on the drive.

16. Type "umount /mnt/usb" and press "Enter."

17. Remove the pen drive from the USB port.

Tips & Warnings

• The latest Linux versions may automatically mount a USB device. If it happens, skip Step 12. However, this step is necessary to mount an unmounted device again (after Step 16).

• Step 12 results in the error message "mount: special device /dev/sdc1 does not exist" if there is no pen drive in the USB port.

References

• Red Hat Linux Networking and System Administration; T. Collings and K. Wall; 2005