.TH AUTOFS 8 "9 Sep 1997"
.SH NAME
autofs \- Service control for the automounter
.SH SYNOPSIS
If a SysV init script system is being used:
.br
.B /etc/init.d/autofs
.I start|stop|restart|reload|status
.P
or if the systemd init system is being used:
.br
.B systemctl
.I start|stop|restart|reload|status
.B autofs.service
.SH "DESCRIPTION"
.B autofs
controls the operation of the
.BR automount (8)
daemon(s) running on the Linux system. Usually
.B autofs
is invoked at system boot time with the
.I start
parameter and at shutdown time with the
.I stop
parameter. Service control actions can also be manually invoked by
the system administrator to shut down, restart, reload or obtain
service status.
.P
.SH "OPERATION"
.B autofs
will consult a configuration file
.I /etc/auto.master
(see
.BR auto.master (5))
by default to find mount points on the system. For each of those mount points
.BR automount (8)
will mount and start a thread, with the appropriate parameters, to
manage the mount point.
.P
.B /etc/init.d/autofs reload
or
.B systemctl autofs.service reload
will check the current auto.master map against the current automount managed
mounts. It will terminate those daemons or threads (depending on
.B autofs
version) whose entries have been removed, re-read the automount maps for
entries that have changed and start new daemons or threads for entries
that have been added.
.P
If an indirect map is modified then the change will become effective immediately.
If an indirect map uses the
.B browse
option, the master map contains direct mount maps or the
.I auto.master
map is modified then the
.B autofs
service control reload action must be rerun to activate the changes.
.P
However, if a map entry has offsets and is currently in use the offset
mounts cannot be updated due to potential mount dependencies. In this
case the map entry offsets will not be updated until after the map
entry has expired.
.P
.B /etc/init.d/autofs status
or
.B systemctl status autofs.service
will display the status of,
.BR automount (8),
running or not. When using the systemd init system the status output includes
somewhat more information related to the service status.
.P
.B systemctl(1)
has more functions than the actions mentioned here, see
.B systemctl(1)
for more information.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.BR automount (8),
.BR autofs (5),
.BR autofs.conf (5),
.BR auto.master (5),
.BR autofs_ldap_auth.conf (5),
.BR systemctl(1).
.SH AUTHOR
This manual page was written by Christoph Lameter <chris@waterf.org>,
for the Debian GNU/Linux system.  Edited by H. Peter Anvin
<hpa@transmeta.com> and Ian Kent <raven@themaw.net>.