Make mounting remote folders a GUI feature

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1

Zorin 18 from Windows 11.

I linked my NAS folders on Nautilus, it's SMB and noticed it was very slow to transfer files. Asked AI for help, created a credential file, mount points and it's 100x faster.

Coming from Windows, I had no idea, this should be made an easy task within Nautilus rather than having to find out the hard way and use the terminal to fix it.

2

Hi and welcome.

Well, first off not every user runs a NAS. I can appreciate your frustration of not having a simple solution, but you have had you first experience of 'GNU/Linux is not Windows' (and vice-versa). Fixes for such as this issue are created by volunteers, sometimes having to undertake reverse-engineering or coding. GNU/Linux is a *nix based Operating System and is not a closed-source system protected by copyrights with salaried employees.

Please could you share your solution for the benefit of other users by creating a post in the 'Tutorials & Guides' section. :wink:

3

The solution was to create mount points with the NAS folders, these are the instructions I followed from Claude AI, I'll add to tutorials.

Permanent Auto-Mount via fstab (Best for always-on access)

  1. Install cifs-utils (for SMB):

bash

   sudo apt install cifs-utils
  1. Create a mount point:

bash

   sudo mkdir /mnt/nas
  1. Store credentials securely:

bash

   sudo nano /etc/nas-credentials

Add:

   username=your_nas_user
   password=your_nas_password

Then lock it: sudo chmod 600 /etc/nas-credentials

  1. Edit fstab:

bash

   sudo nano /etc/fstab

Add a line like:

   //192.168.x.x/sharename  /mnt/nas  cifs  credentials=/etc/nas-credentials,iocharset=utf8,_netdev  0  0
  1. Test it:

bash

   sudo mount -a

Once each mount point is added, for example /mnt/Music, /mnt/Photo, /mnt/video etc, in nemo address bar enter /mnt to see every mounted folder, drag to the bottom left pane to bookmark them.

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4

Just for clarity - each of those steps can be done via GUI - you do not have to use terminal. Using terminal is just much faster and more efficient.
But creating a new folder (mkdir) is doable in the file manager, right click > new folder
Editing, creating or opening files can be done with the built in GUI Text editor.
Mounting and automounting partitions can be done with GUI Disks app.

Using the terminal saved you a lot of running around and mouse clicking.

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