Can't get NFS to work

[tomini]

Hello,

I can't get NFS to work on my ODROID HC4 with OpenMediaVault setup running on Armbian Buster.

VLC on my Android phone just says this:

I got a tip to use NFS on Linux - Kodi running on LibreElec and my phone

...and SMB with my laptop running Win10. Is this setup fine or should I be concern about any issues that may come from using different operating systems?

 

Thank you 

[10leej]

So I don't know android but on a different linux MacOS system you can troubleshoot

 

Run this to see if the server is available

sudo showmount -e ip.address.of.server

if it is you need to mount it locally first then you can use it, I did a write up on my own site but sadly I don't use OMV. I suggest you use SMB for Android

[tomini]

5 hours ago, 10leej said:

So I don't know android but on a different linux MacOS system you can troubleshoot

 

Run this to see if the server is available

sudo showmount -e ip.address.of.server

if it is you need to mount it locally first then you can use it, I did a write up on my own site but sadly I don't use OMV. I suggest you use SMB for Android

Where should I run this comment? I have Windows PC and I see sudo in that command, So run this in the Armbian of the NAS? That doesn't make sense...running showmount for ip address of itself.

I heard something about "moving it to export" if I want to use NFS...but I don't know what that even means and how to do it.

Otherwise SMB works on a Android phone and Windows PC well. Still, I have to test Kodi (running on LibreElec) later.

 

I got told that SMB is the biggest flaw I could ever voluntarily enable...

Plus SMB doesn't play good with Linux filesystem and EXT4. And they are quite right.

I got this error/warning (this pic if coppied from internet, as I have my PC in different language) :

If I understand this correctly...it doesn't matter, although some documents can store nescessary data in its properties...

[10leej]

12 hours ago, 10leej said:

So I don't know android but on a different linux or MacOS system you can troubleshoot

 

[10leej]

7 hours ago, tomini said:

I got told that SMB is the biggest flaw I could ever voluntarily enable...

Plus SMB doesn't play good with Linux filesystem and EXT4. And they are quite right.

Mmm, not sure where they're coming with that, SMB works well enough these days, the issues is just when you involve WIndows since the Windows SMB server is proprietary and isn't 1 to 1 compatible with samba (the Linux SMB server).

SMB does work good with ext4, the issue here is file permissions which are treated different from WIndows and Linux since WIndows is still DOS and Linux is Unix-like. The two systems are quite incompatible when it comes to permissions so the usualy practice is to strip permissions entirely, which is what causes the error prompt you see.

[tomini]

5 hours ago, 10leej said:

Mmm, not sure where they're coming with that, SMB works well enough these days, the issues is just when you involve WIndows since the Windows SMB server is proprietary and isn't 1 to 1 compatible with samba (the Linux SMB server).

SMB does work good with ext4, the issue here is file permissions which are treated different from WIndows and Linux since WIndows is still DOS and Linux is Unix-like. The two systems are quite incompatible when it comes to permissions so the usualy practice is to strip permissions entirely, which is what causes the error prompt you see.

So I shouldn't run into any issues?

I really wouldn't want my filesystem to get corrupted or have issues with some files...

I just tried and I could connect my Kodi box to NFS and SMB. When I tried to save a file via NFS...I couldn't find it anywhere. But it should save in the folder I told it to.

 

Samba worked great. Saved in the folder that I was in. So maybe NFS is setup wrong? Because I saw some guides on how to make it writable, but didn't understand it as I just assumed that writing to NAS via any of those protocols would just work no matter what.

I was wrong...

 

Only plus for NFS is that it isn't resource hungry - on both sides. But idk how deep this one goes.

[10leej]

On 4/3/2021 at 4:19 PM, tomini said:

So I shouldn't run into any issues?

I really wouldn't want my filesystem to get corrupted or have issues with some files...

I just tried and I could connect my Kodi box to NFS and SMB. When I tried to save a file via NFS...I couldn't find it anywhere. But it should save in the folder I told it to.

 

Samba worked great. Saved in the folder that I was in. So maybe NFS is setup wrong? Because I saw some guides on how to make it writable, but didn't understand it as I just assumed that writing to NAS via any of those protocols would just work no matter what.

I was wrong...

 

Only plus for NFS is that it isn't resource hungry - on both sides. But idk how deep this one goes.

NFS will also have a performance advantage, I think. I wouldn't really know I use it mainly to mount my /home directories on the 17+ linux devices around my house and lighted I run a 2.5gbps network at home on a beefy SSD server (I'm in an RV, SSDs are more reliable) so my results would likely be wildly different from yours.

As for corruption that isn't really as much of an issue you'd think as long as your filesystem supports basic file verification you'll be fine. If the network protocol causes issues, it's usually hardware related or your doing something very very unusual just basic multimedia streaming to kodi is read only, not writing so there's really no corruption to worry about.

 

Even then if you care for resource usage on a network protocol, you should run a more modern server and not one of the many ARM based solutions (as in, don't use a rasp Pi for your server). It's about as ridiculous an argument for comparing how efficient Linux distros are by memory usage, and not CPU cycles/usage.

[tomini]

6 hours ago, 10leej said:

NFS will also have a performance advantage, I think. I wouldn't really know I use it mainly to mount my /home directories on the 17+ linux devices around my house and lighted I run a 2.5gbps network at home on a beefy SSD server (I'm in an RV, SSDs are more reliable) so my results would likely be wildly different from yours.

As for corruption that isn't really as much of an issue you'd think as long as your filesystem supports basic file verification you'll be fine. If the network protocol causes issues, it's usually hardware related or your doing something very very unusual just basic multimedia streaming to kodi is read only, not writing so there's really no corruption to worry about.

 

Even then if you care for resource usage on a network protocol, you should run a more modern server and not one of the many ARM based solutions (as in, don't use a rasp Pi for your server). It's about as ridiculous an argument for comparing how efficient Linux distros are by memory usage, and not CPU cycles/usage.

The last point...yeah I'm running ARM-based system  (Odroid HC4 - but I picked it for price....BUT 'cuz it has SATA controller with proper SATA connections and not just a lazy USB controller like some RPi)

But to my defense I don't have money for anything else. However I'm starting to understand the prices behind complete systems like Synology... It's a huuuuge pain to deal with certain things. I don't know for example why I can't use some folder for a docker (portainer) container I made. It does whatever it feels like it. Plus I found out that I don't truly understand the permissions and how it is handled... Using Samba with Windows and mixing two systems doesn't help either.

[Master Disaster]

1 hour ago, tomini said:

The last point...yeah I'm running ARM-based system  (Odroid HC4 - but I picked it for price....BUT 'cuz it has SATA controller with proper SATA connections and not just a lazy USB controller like some RPi)

But to my defense I don't have money for anything else. However I'm starting to understand the prices behind complete systems like Synology... It's a huuuuge pain to deal with certain things. I don't know for example why I can't use some folder for a docker (portainer) container I made. It does whatever it feels like it. Plus I found out that I don't truly understand the permissions and how it is handled... Using Samba with Windows and mixing two systems doesn't help either.

I think I can (maybe) help on this last point as I think I've had it with my Synology and worked around it.

 

I'll explain it as it was on my Synology and hopefully you can see if your issue is the same.

 

Docker needs to be running the containers on the same user account as the owner of the folder you're trying to mount. On a normal Docker install this is not an issue since Docker makes itself a user and adds that user to the admin group however on NAS devices it appears as though Docker cannot create this account and grant itself admin access so as soon as you try to mount a container folder to the root FS Docker throws a fit and either the container hangs or just turns off after a few seconds.

 

The workaround is to look for containers that support the UID & GID environment variables (User ID & Group ID). Then you have to use SSH to retrieve the admin user ID and admin group ID and enter these as environment variables on the containers config page. This allows Docker to run the container under the admin account/group and have the permissions to access the root FS folder.

 

Also should add, I've personally used SAMBA on Linux as storage for all my Windows machines for multiple years and I've never experienced any issues with permission handling between EXT4 or ZFS to NTFS.

 

Not sure if you're aware but SAMBA is the Linux service that is used to make a Linux server act as a Windows Domain Controller, SAMBA is very capable of handling permissions between Linux & Windows, it has to be by design. IIRC Microsoft even contribute to SAMBA development.

[tomini]

4 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

I think I can (maybe) help on this last point as I think I've had it with my Synology and worked around it.

 

I'll explain it as it was on my Synology and hopefully you can see if your issue is the same.

 

Docker needs to be running the containers on the same user account as the owner of the folder you're trying to mount. On a normal Docker install this is not an issue since Docker makes itself a user and adds that user to the admin group however on NAS devices it appears as though Docker cannot create this account and grant itself admin access so as soon as you try to mount a container folder to the root FS Docker throws a fit and either the container hangs or just turns off after a few seconds.

 

The workaround is to look for containers that support the UID & GID environment variables (User ID & Group ID). Then you have to use SSH to retrieve the admin user ID and admin group ID and enter these as environment variables on the containers config page. This allows Docker to run the container under the admin account/group and have the permissions to access the root FS folder.

 

Also should add, I've personally used SAMBA on Linux as storage for all my Windows machines for multiple years and I've never experienced any issues with permission handling between EXT4 or ZFS to NTFS.

 

Not sure if you're aware but SAMBA is the Linux service that is used to make a Linux server act as a Windows Domain Controller, SAMBA is very capable of handling permissions between Linux & Windows, it has to be by design.

Could we chat about it on Discord or somewhere else? English is not my primary language and I don't want to spam these awesome forums with every misunderstanding and clarification (but don't worry, I understand...just sometimes I need r/explainlikeimfive approach ). Of course you or I can post the solution from our chat (or at least what we tried and didn't help), so others can find this topic helpful.

My setup is in my mind complicated and I'm just merging various guides without fully understanding everything.

Linux doesn't respect mistakes so kindly like Windows...

 

Thanks a lot.

[Master Disaster]

12 minutes ago, tomini said:

Could we chat about it on Discord or somewhere else? English is not my primary language and I don't want to spam these awesome forums with every misunderstanding and clarification (but don't worry, I understand...just sometimes I need r/explainlikeimfive approach ). Of course you or I can post the solution from our chat (or at least what we tried and didn't help), so others can find this topic helpful.

My setup is in my mind complicated and I'm just merging various guides without fully understanding everything.

Linux doesn't respect mistakes so kindly like Windows...

 

Thanks a lot.

I don't have a Discord account, sorry.

 

Honestly its pretty simple once you work it out. I'll use an example from my own NAS so lets say you want to run a Valve Source Engine Dedicated Server.

 

The official steamcmd container is here - https://registry.hub.docker.com/r/steamcmd/steamcmd/ - however this container doesn't support passing UID & GID.

 

Instead I had to find this one - https://registry.hub.docker.com/r/ich777/steamcmd/ - which when we look at the list of EVs does have the required support...

Quote

STEAMCMD_DIR	Folder for SteamCMD	/serverdata/steamcmd
SERVER_DIR	Folder for gamefile	/serverdata/serverfiles
GAME_ID	SteamID for server	232330
GAME_NAME	SRCDS gamename	cstrike
GAME_PARAMS	Values to start the server	-secure +maxplayers 32 +map de_dust2
UID	User Identifier	99
GID	Group Identifier	100
GAME_PORT	Port the server will be running on	27015

Then you just SSH to your NAS and run the ID command which will list all the UIDs & GIDs, take the admin UID & GID and enter them into the containers config page.

 

That's it.