Acecssing NFS share without root privileges

Question

I want to access an NFS share from within a Docker container. I don't have control over how that Docker container is started, so I can't run it in privileged mode etc. But honestly, I don't even want to run it in privileged mode because that is a completely unnecessary security risk.

It's a shame that the standard utility mount always requires root privileges. In my opinion a non-root user should simply be allowed to mount to whatever locations that user has permissions for. Is there an alternative tool that would allow me to access that NFS share without root privileges?

Answer 1

This isn't possible without having root access to either execute the mount command or the ability to install additional software within the container, again you'd need root/sudo access to do this.

The closest you can get to something that might be usable here for you would be to setup the NFS entry within the container's /etc/fstab file with the user option, so that non-root users could mount it.

$ cat /etc/fstab
10.1.1.10:/export/alice /home/alice/Desktop/mnt nfs rw,noauto,user 0 0

References

• http://xmodulo.com/how-to-mount-nfs-share-as-regular-user.html

Answer 2

Inside the server machine you need to create a folder with the "Others" group having write access.

I'm still figuring out how to force NFS to force an umask for every new file that you create on that share, but that should get you started.