[Best-Of] Assorted Mount testing

[CwF]

I wanted to iron out my understanding of what is needed for a minimal install to mount a thumbdrive. My prior minimalist solution was pmount and the plugdev group. Using systemd-mount elsewhere for tmpfs mounts I finally eureka'ed the question of why I was using pmount.

Test case is a 1007 package bookworm XFCE. Note that fuse(3), udisk2, gvfs, sudo, and a few dozen of their dependencies are not installed. So I removed pmount and removed the user from plugdev.

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# gpasswd -d user plugdev

I use a vm, so I pass a usb drive to the vm using virt-viewer's interface. The VM is remote, the usb local.

Of course nothing shows up on the desktop without gvfs installed. The user lsusb see's it, and with a label it is enumerated in /dev/disk/by-label.

I now need to add a polkit rule, I do so in my chosen /etc/polkit-1/localauthority/30-site.d/42-users.pkla rule file using a root thunar to navigate and clicking opens the file in a root mouspad so I can add
org.freedesktop.systemd1.manage-units;

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[User Permissions]
Identity=unix-user:user;
Action=org.xfce.xfce4-terminal;com.ubuntu.pkexec.synaptic;org.xfce.mousepad;org.xfce.thunar;more_here;
ResultActive=yes

Result of root GUI easyButtons...

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$ systemd-mount /dev/disk/by-label/USB_POOL ~/Public
Started unit home-user-Public.mount for mount point: /home/user/Public
$ systemd-umount /dev/disk/by-label/USB_POOL
Stopped unit home-user-Public.mount for mount point: /home/user/Public

Go ahead, shoot me root GUI haters, I happen to know you'll miss....

[lindi]

What is root GUI easyButtons?

[CwF]

What is root GUI easyButtons?

a poor expression!
Some that know me ask where the easyButton is. Instead of convoluted terminal commands devolving into a 'how do I get root' question devolving into a don't use gui's as root....and so on.
I'll make a easyButton, or maybe a systemd automount unit in this case...

[None1975]

Of course nothing shows up on the desktop without gvfs installed.

Gvfs is not needed for mounting usb sticks. The Gnome virtual filesystem (gvfs) provides mounting and trash functionality. GVFS uses udisks2 for mounting functionality and is the recommended solution for most file managers. But in Debian, the udisks2 package is independent of gvfs, so it can be freely installed and used without gvfs junk.

For trash functionality i would recommend using package trash-cli.

Particularly where using - or intending to use - a lightweight environment, it should be noted that more file manager features and functions will usually mean the use of more memory.

[CwF]

Gvfs is not needed for mounting usb sticks

Yes, I used pmount with a user in plugdev for a long time. Now, systemd which also does not require udisk2. Without gvfs it still doesn't show on the desktop, which I don't need it to.