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MOUNT_PORTAL(8)             System Manager's Manual            MOUNT_PORTAL(8)

NAME
     mount_portal - mount the portal daemon

SYNOPSIS
     mount_portal [-o options] /etc/portal.conf mount_point

DESCRIPTION
     The mount_portal command attaches an instance of the portal daemon to the
     global filesystem namespace.  The conventional mount point is /p.  The
     directory specified by mount_point is converted to an absolute path
     before use.  This command is normally executed by mount(8) at boot time.

     The options are as follows:

     -o      Options are specified with a -o flag followed by a comma
             separated string of options.  See the mount(8) man page for
             possible options and their meanings.

     The portal daemon provides an open service.  Objects opened under the
     portal mount point are dynamically created by the portal daemon according
     to rules specified in the named configuration file.  Using this mechanism
     allows descriptors such as sockets to be made available in the filesystem
     namespace.

     The portal daemon works by being passed the full pathname of the object
     being opened.  The daemon creates an appropriate descriptor according to
     the rules in the configuration file, and then passes the descriptor back
     to the calling process as the result of the open system call.

NAMESPACE
     By convention, the portal daemon divides the namespace into sub-
     namespaces, each of which handles objects of a particular type.

     Currently, four sub-namespaces are implemented: tcp, fs, rfilter and
     wfilter.  The tcp namespace takes a hostname and a port (slash separated)
     and creates an open TCP/IP connection.  The fs namespace opens the named
     file, starting back at the root directory.  This can be used to provide a
     controlled escape path from a chrooted environment.

     The rfilter and wfilter namespaces open a pipe to a process, typically a
     data-filter such as compression or decompression programs.  The rfilter
     namespace opens a read-only pipe, while the wfilter namespace opens a
     write-only pipe.  See the EXAMPLES section below for more examples.

CONFIGURATION FILE
     The configuration file contains a list of rules.  Each rule takes one
     line and consists of two or more whitespace separated fields.  A hash
     ("#") character at beginning of the line, or after whitespace, causes the
     remainder of a line to be ignored.  Blank lines are ignored.

     The first field is a pathname prefix to match against the requested
     pathname.  If a match is found, the second field tells the daemon what
     type of object to create.  Subsequent fields are passed to the creation
     function.

     The rfilter and wfilter namespaces have additional meanings for the
     remaining fields.  The third field specifies a prefix that is to be
     stripped off of the passed name before passing it on to the pipe program.
     If the prefix does not match, no stripping is performed.  The fourth
     argument specifies the program to use for the pipe.  Any remaining fields
     are passed to the pipe program.  If the string "%s" exists within these
     remaining fields, it will be replaced by the path after stripping is
     performed.  If there is no field after the program name, "%s" will be
     assumed, to maintain similarity with the tcp and fs namespaces.

FILES
     /p/*

EXAMPLES
     A tutorial and several examples are provided in
     /usr/share/examples/mount_portal.  The following is an example
     configuration file.

     # @(#)portal.conf       5.1 (Berkeley) 7/13/92
     tcp/            tcp tcp/
     fs/             file fs/
     echo/           rfilter echo/   echo %s
     echo_nostrip/   rfilter nostrip echo %s
     echo_noslash    rfilter echo_noslash    echo %s
     gzcat/          rfilter gzcat/ gzcat %s
     gzip/           wfilter gzip/   gzip > %s
     gzip9/          wfilter gzip9/  gzip -9 > %s
     ftp/            rfilter ftp/    ftp -Vo - %s
     ftp://          rfilter nostrip ftp -Vo - %s
     http://         rfilter nostrip ftp -Vo - %s
     bzcat/          rfilter bzcat/  bzcat %s
     nroff/          rfilter nroff/  nroff -man %s

     As is true with many other filesystems, a weird sense of humor is handy.

     Notice that after the keynames, like nroff/ and bzcat/, we typically use
     another slash.  In reality, the mount_portal process changes directory to
     /, which makes the subsequent slash unnecessary.  However, the extra
     slash provides a visual hint that we are not operating on an ordinary
     file.  An alternative would be to change the configuration file to
     something like:

     nroff%  rfilter nroff%  nroff -man

     One might then use

     less /p/nroff%/usr/share/man/man8/mount_portal.8

SEE ALSO
     mount(2), unmount(2), fstab(5), mount(8)

HISTORY
     The mount_portal utility first appeared in 4.4BSD.  The rfilter and
     wfilter capabilities first appeared in NetBSD 1.5.  The portal kernel
     driver was removed and mount_portal was converted to use puffs(3) in
     NetBSD 6.0.

BUGS
     This filesystem may not be NFS-exported.

NetBSD 10.99                     May 23, 2019                     NetBSD 10.99