How to Map a Network Drive Onto Ubuntu 14.04 Permanently

Published on August 11, 2014

In this simple tutorial, we will guide you on how to map a network drive, using a Windows share as an example, onto Ubuntu 14.04 LTS with read and write permissions permanently. We will be performing all actions in a terminal window. If you’re not familiar with Linux commands, don’t worry; just paste the provided commands into the terminal and hit enter to execute them. We will also include screenshots to make the process clearer.

Preparation:

Before we can start mounting using cifs, we need to perform some preliminary actions.

1. Open a terminal by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on your keyboard. Paste the following command to create a mount point (you can replace ‘Ji-share’ with your preferred name):

   1	sudo mkdir /media/Ji-share

   

2. Install cifs-utils, which provides support for cross-platform file sharing with Microsoft Windows, OS X, and other Unix systems. You can install it from the Ubuntu Software Center or by running the following command:

   1	sudo apt-get install cifs-utils

3. Edit the /etc/nsswitch.conf file:

   1	sudo gedit /etc/nsswitch.conf

   Find the line that looks like:

   hosts: files mdns4_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] dns

   Change it to:

   hosts: files mdns4_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] wins dns

   

4. Run the following command to allow your Ubuntu system to resolve Windows computer names on a DHCP network:

   1	sudo apt-get install libnss-winbind winbind

   After this, reboot your Ubuntu system or restart your network.

Mount (Map) Network Drive:

Now, we will edit the fstab file to mount the network share on startup.

1. First, create a backup of the fstab file:

   1	sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab_old

   If you ever need to restore your backup, you can run:

   1	sudo mv /etc/fstab_old /etc/fstab

2. Create a credentials file using the following command:

   1	gedit ~/.smbcredentials

   Inside this file, insert the username and password for accessing the remote share, replacing “Ji” and “741852963” with your own credentials. Save the file.

   username=YourUsername
   password=YourPassword

   

3. Run the following command to get your gid and uid, replacing “handbook” with your username:

   1	id YourUsername

   

4. Now, edit the fstab file by running the command:

   1	sudo gedit /etc/fstab

   Add the following line to the end of the file, replacing the placeholders with your specific information:

   //192.168.1.5/share /media/Ji-share cifs credentials=/home/YourUsername/.smbcredentials,iocharset=utf8,gid=1000,uid=1000,file_mode=0777,dir_mode=0777 0 0

   

5. Finally, run the following command in the terminal to mount the network share:

   1	sudo mount -a

   This will map the network share, and you will be able to access it in the Unity Launcher and Nautilus file browser.

That’s it! You have successfully mapped a network drive onto Ubuntu 14.04 LTS with permanent read and write permissions.