Can't access mounted NFS directory: "permission denied"
 

My problem is when I try to access the mounted NFS directory using "ls" or "cd" or "dir", I get the error message, "permission denied".

I have gone through the usual simple procedure for exporting and mounting NFS shares. The NFS file seems to be mounted OK and the directories seem to be exported OK. They are in the /etc/exports file as "host address"(rw) and all the references I've suggest that this is all that is necessary. I thought it might be a user issue, but I created a user in the client with the same password and name as the exported file system, but that doesn't work either. I tried "no_root_squash" for an export and I can't even get the file exported.

What is going on?

Here is the /etc/exports file:

Here is the mount command I am using:

I've also tried the mount with no options. "host address 1" is replaced with numeric addresses. I've also tried other mount points.

Double check the group and everyone permissions on the exported directory.

My /etc/exports file is
/export *(rw,no_root_squash)


Hope this helps

What are the actual permissions of the files, that could be a factor in some cases?

I am sure I have found the problem.

When you mount an exported file, it is still owned by some user on the exporting machine and you must have the access privileges to access the directory and files. Access permission goes by UID, not user name or password. So even if you create a user with the same user name and password as the owner of the exported file on the importing host, you will not get permission until the UIDs are the same. In fact, I'll guess that different user names and passwords with the same UID can share files and directories accross an NFS share.

You know, I looked in no less then three Linux Administrators books and only one had this information and it was not in the part on NFS. Strangely enough, the information was actually in a Linux Documentation Project How-To which is a very spotty source of reliable information. Linux documentation is very poor.

If memory serves, the access to the files by the remote system is done via some anonymous user ID. You can control this UID/GID in the exports file. If you add this user to the group that owns the files, you should be able to access the files from the remote system. You should be careful when you do this, though, especially if you allow rw access.

If my memory serves, not by default. Access defaults to "nobody", that is, "permission denied" which is what I was getting. Creating an anonymous user ID is an option and the files owned by such a user can be configured in /etc/exports.

Which reminds me. Does anyone have any experience with the Red Hat NFS Configure GUI tool? I was using mine and had some problems with it and now it does not start up anymore when I click its icon. Basically what happened was I looked at the exports file it was creating and found that it was not adding options to both the host addresses I included for permission.

As an example, I had from the Red Had configure tool,

I edited it so that it was,

And now the GUI tool will not come up even after changing it back.