problems with gedit

hitlaur · 11-09-2004, 03:15 PM

I recently added Fedora Core to my computer to coexist with Windows, and have them on two different hard drives. I wanted to be able to retrieve data from the Windows hard drive, and to do that, I had to add the drive to the fstab file, right?

So, I opened the terminal window, became root, typed in gedit /etc/fstab, and I got a message that said this: (gedit:2449): GnomeUI-WARNING **: While connecting to session manager:
Authentication Rejected, reason : None of the authentication protocols specified are supported and host-based authentication failed.

I wasn't sure if this made any difference, so I typed in the data that corresponded with the windows drive into gedit: dev/hda /mnt/windows vfat defaults,users,auto 0 0

I pressed save, and exited gedit. I created the mountpoint using mkdir /mnt/windows, and I thought nothing happened for some reason, so I typed it in again. I figured it must have worked this time, so I restarted, and the icon wasn't there on the desktop. (I typed "auto" in the fstab file) So, I right clicked on the desktop and clicked "windows" under the "drives" section, and it said that Nautilus was unable to mount selected volume because the directory did not exist, so I removed it, and created it again.

I opened up gedit again to see if I had made a typo (which some people are prone to do) and it said that the file "ect/fstab" did not exist. I told the program I would like to create it, and I got another error message saying I couldn't create the file because a directory component in the filename doesn't exist or is a dangling symbolic link.

I am completely stumped. Any help would be much appreciated. (:

mjrich · 11-09-2004, 03:34 PM

The first error is probably due to root not having access to X, for security reasons. When you opened Gedit, did you actually see /etc/fstab, or was it a new file, or did it fail entirely ?

The second error is due to using /dev/hda rather than /dev/hda1 (or /dev/hda2 - there's often a small extra partition at the front of a windows drive). Anyway, I'd do it all from the command line:

Code:

# su
#      (root password)
# mount              
# mkdir /mnt/windows
# man vim
# vim /etc/fstab

Then add the following line:

/dev/hda1 /mnt/windows vfat ro,user,auto,umask=0022 0

Cheers,

mj

hitlaur · 11-09-2004, 08:45 PM

Thank you for the help, but I have another problem with editing the fstab file. When I first opened gedit, in the beginning, I saw the fstab file. Now, when opening it, the file will not show at all.

After entering what you said in the fstab file from the command line, I got the error, "E486: Pattern not found: dev". I'm not really sure, except for not putting the correct drive name, what I could have done to mess up the fstab file.

mjrich · 11-09-2004, 09:13 PM

If using Vim (highly recommended

) then you'll need to go to 'insert' mode before trying to add /dev/hda1 etc. Download a cheat sheet from vimdoc.sourceforge.net/ or have a quick glance at the manual page for Vim (man vim).

Essentially: type "i" to go to insert mode, then use the cursors to navigate to where you want to go (there are quicker methods, but that'll suffice for now), type what you want, then press "escape" to return to control mode, then type ":wq" to write the file, and then quit. Voila !

Good luck,

mj

hitlaur · 11-09-2004, 10:16 PM

Aha! Thank you very much for your help! Now all my silly fonts and documents can stop collecting dust on Windows.

Thank you again. (: