# Creating the /etc/fstab File

The `/etc/fstab` file is used by some programs to determine where file systems are to be mounted by default, in which order, and which must be checked (for integrity errors) prior to mounting. Create a new file systems table like this:

    cat > /etc/fstab << "EOF"
    # Begin /etc/fstab

    # file system  mount-point  type   options          dump  fsck
    #                                                         order

    /dev/[xxx]     /            [fff]  defaults         1     1
    /dev/[yyy]     swap         swap   pri=1            0     0
    proc           /proc        proc   defaults         0     0
    sysfs          /sys         sysfs  defaults         0     0
    devpts         /dev/pts     devpts gid=&gid-tty;,mode=620   0     0
    shm            /dev/shm     tmpfs  defaults         0     0
    tmpfs          /run         tmpfs  defaults         0     0
    devtmpfs       /dev         devtmpfs mode=0755,nosuid 0     0

    # End /etc/fstab
    EOF

Replace `[xxx]`, `[yyy]`, and `[fff]` with the values appropriate for the system, for example, `hda2`, `hda5`, and `ext2`. For details on the six fields in this file, see `man 5 fstab`.

The `/dev/shm` mount point for `tmpfs` is included to allow enabling POSIX-shared memory. The kernel must have the required support built into it for this to work (more about this is in the next section). Please note that very little software currently uses POSIX-shared memory. Therefore, consider the `/dev/shm` mount point optional. For more information, see `Documentation/filesystems/tmpfs.txt` in the kernel source tree.