auto_master mount point, how to show in finder?

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Level 1

19 points

auto_master mount point, how to show in finder?

Hello,

I am setting up a mount point by creating a custom mount file that is referenced in auto_master. I did this using the instructions at the following site:
Autofs Goodness in Leopard 10.5

I am basically creating a mountpoint to a network share in a directory off the root of the HD, but my problem is, when autofs mounts the drive, the directory I created to store the mountpoint vanishes from Finder. Is there an autofs setting that causes this? Basically I need that directory to be visible in finder for the apps that we use. I also have to have it in that directory off the root to match the path that is set across a large number of other machines, both mac and windows. This is on a render farm, so all of the machines, both mac and windows, must refer to the same path when running jobs.

MacPro, Mac OS X (10.5.2), 8gig RAM, 8 cores

Posted on Apr 26, 2008 2:50 PM

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Answer 1

nerowolfe

Level 6

13,090 points

Apr 26, 2008 4:48 PM in response to AlphaJoe

You might look into Tinkertool which can hide/reveal system folders quite simply.
http://www.bresink.com/osx/0TinkerTool/download.html
I am not sure it can show/hide a single system file, though.
There are most likely some terminal commands to unhide a single file. You could google for a command or script to do so.

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Answer 2

nerowolfe

Level 6

13,090 points

Apr 26, 2008 5:10 PM in response to nerowolfe

This link might also be helpful:
http://projectmouse.org/2027/slightly-obscured-volumes-in-mac-os-x
I believe it's the '@' attribute in the file that needs to be changed.

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Answer 3

AlphaJoe Author

Level 1

19 points

Apr 27, 2008 3:53 AM in response to nerowolfe

nerowolfe wrote:
This link might also be helpful:
http://projectmouse.org/2027/slightly-obscured-volumes-in-mac-os-x
I believe it's the '@' attribute in the file that needs to be changed.

This looks like it may work for me. when i get back to work I will snag the dev tools and install it.

Unhiding all the system and hidden files doesn't seem like the best way of doing it.

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Answer 4

AlphaJoe Author

Level 1

19 points

Apr 28, 2008 7:49 AM in response to nerowolfe

Ok, yeah this isn't working. Something is happening when I activate the mount and it causes the directory to vanish from the finder.

When I try and use SetFile to make it visible I get the following error.

sudo SetFile -a v /dir
Password:
ERROR: Unexpected Error. (-5000) on file: /dir

When looking at the dir, the @ attribue isn't set to begin with, so I am not sure that that has much to do with it. When I look at the different items in the root directory list, there isn't much correlation between items with the @ symbol and whether it shows up in the finder or not.

I am going to keep digging and see what I can find, but this is driving me out of my mind. All I need in the final step of this configuration is to keep the dir showing in finder and all is well in my world. I would hate to wipe all the leopard machines and put Tiger back on since it works fine there.

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Answer 5

AlphaJoe Author

Level 1

19 points

Apr 28, 2008 3:22 PM in response to AlphaJoe

Ok, I think I may be on to something here. When I do the automount, what happens is the automount process converts the entire directory structure to a sym link which is no longer visible in the finder from the normal path. Leopard forces you to go through All..->Servers->Server->Share... -or- /Network/Servers/<Server>/<Share>.

I am not sure exactly where I should go from here, but I am going to dig deeper into the autofs setup to see if there is a different way of handling the mount.

Message was edited by: AlphaJoe

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Answer 6

AlphaJoe Author

Level 1

19 points

Apr 29, 2008 6:15 PM in response to AlphaJoe

Ok, I have a workaround but it is odd that I can't get the mount to show up in finder directly. Basically, I create the automount point off the root of the drive in /server/share. Then I create a symbolic link in the root of the drive which points to the now vanished mount point. The sym link shows up in finder as a mount, and when i am in my 3D software, i can now set the project to be in the share that shows up in the sym link, but is actually pointing to the hidden mount.

What a pain.

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