file system To make a
file system available for access.
Unix does this by associating the file system with a
directory (the "mount point") within a currently mounted
file system. The "root" file system is mounted on the
rootdirectory, "/" early in the
boot sequence. "mount" is also
the
Unix command to do this, "unmount" breaks the
association.
E.g., "mount attaches a named file system to the file system
hierarchy at the pathname location directory [...]" --
Unixmanual page mount(8).
File systems are usually mounted either at
boot time under
control of
/etc/rc (or one of its subfiles) or on demand by
systems as separate directory hierarchies without any common
ancestor or root directory.
Apparently derived from the physical sense of "mount" meaning
"attach", as in "head-mounted display", or "set up", as in
(1997-04-14)