Skip to Content
Ubuntu Linux Bible, 11th Edition
book

Ubuntu Linux Bible, 11th Edition

by David Clinton, Christopher Negus
December 2025
Intermediate to advanced
704 pages
19h 14m
English
Wiley
Content preview from Ubuntu Linux Bible, 11th Edition

CHAPTER 20Configuring an NFS File Server

Instead of representing storage devices as drive letters (A:, B:, C:, and so on), as they are in Microsoft operating systems, Linux systems invisibly connect filesystems from multiple hard disks, USB drives, CD-ROMs, and other local devices to form a single Linux filesystem. The Network File System (NFS) facility enables you to extend your Linux filesystem to connect filesystems on other computers to your local directory structure.

An NFS file server provides an easy way to share large amounts of data among the users and computers in an organization. An administrator of a Linux system that is configured to share its filesystems using NFS has to perform the following tasks to set up NFS:

  1. Set up the network. NFS is typically used on private networks as opposed to public networks, such as the Internet.
  2. Start the NFS service. Several service daemons need to start up and run to have a fully operational NFS service. On Ubuntu, you can start up the nfs-server service.
  3. Choose what to share from the server. Decide which directories (folders) on your Linux NFS server to make available to other computers. You can choose any point in the filesystem and make all files and directories below that point accessible to other computers.
  4. Set up security on the server. You can use several ...
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.

Read now

Unlock full access

More than 5,000 organizations count on O’Reilly

AirBnbBlueOriginElectronic ArtsHomeDepotNasdaqRakutenTata Consultancy Services

QuotationMarkO’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.
Julian F.
Head of Cybersecurity
QuotationMarkI wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.
Addison B.
Field Engineer
QuotationMarkI’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.
Amir M.
Data Platform Tech Lead
QuotationMarkI'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
Mark W.
Embedded Software Engineer

You might also like

Linux Bible, 11th Edition

Linux Bible, 11th Edition

Christopher Negus

Publisher Resources

ISBN: 9781394349760