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Is there a specific mount point to use for a partition so that it would appear separately in the side pane?

I mean that it would appear separately in the left pane of PCManFM or Thunar the way windows-partition and external usb devices appear.

(I do not mean it being the /home partition. Nor it being something like /boot because this would not display it as a partition on the left pane but it would look as a folder with that address (see this question). Would (any) such partition be kept after reinstall? Are there possible mount points with any name after / - like /somename? I wonder whether what I ask here is possible. I guess this question is very contaminated by the Windows experience.)

Here's a picture of the left pane in pcmanfm with the Windows partition (not mounted yet)

left pane of file manager

P.S. This question is not about changing my present partitions, I just want to know if that is possible. I'm in Lubuntu 12.10.

Edit after answer and comments:

I have an answer+comments saying that the partition should not have a mount point specified in order to achieve the asked result. How to create a partition (whether during or after install procedure) without setting the mount-point?

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1 Answers1

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Are only non-linux partitions (Windows and external drives) displayed as such in the left pane of PCManFM and Thunar?

No. Format a USB flash drive as Ext3/4 and you'll see it appear there too. If you would have another partition on your hard drive without any mount point specified in /etc/fstab it would appear there too.

The way the file manager mounts and manages the mounts as shown in the sidebar, has nothing to do with the system mounts. It's about what is mounting it. Using

gvfs-mount -l

you can see which are already managed by your desktop environment. This answer and the manpage of gvfs-mount will explain quite well how to mount filesystems the command-line way the same way as your file manager does that programmatically.

GVFS uses FUSE, an user space level filesystem approach, rather than in-kernel. It's about who manages the mounts on your system. The regular GUI file manager does not manage the system mounts (cat /proc/mounts) by design.

Would (any) such partition be kept after reinstall?

Completely unrelated. This is an option in the installer.

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gertvdijk
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    @cipricus No, the answer is no. I have an internal hard drive with a Ext4 partition. It shows up in any file manager there as I don't have it managed by my system. But if you would have rephrased to "will it hide volumes managed by fstab?" then it would be Yes. – gertvdijk Jan 15 '13 at 12:47
  • so, a "partition on your hard drive without any mount point specified" it would appear there? can one create a partition during install without setting a mount point? i thought that no. how you create such partition? in fact that was my question, because i thought that some special path had to be written for the mount point (instead of / or /home etc) to get that specific result. –  Jan 15 '13 at 12:50
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    @cipricus Yes. Using any partition editor and creating a filesystem on it (e.g. mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdX9). The installer also allows you to in the advanced mode and not setting any mount point. However, I prefer to do things myself afterwards and not fiddle with partitions not needed at installation time. If the bold part of your comment above was your question to ask, then why did you ask something else? – gertvdijk Jan 15 '13 at 12:52
  • well, could you add that into your answer? i guess that is the definitive answer to my question, if you only could detail a bit the phrase "Using any partition editor and creating a filesystem on it (e.g. mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdX9)" as answer. –  Jan 15 '13 at 12:56
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    Your question was suggesting too much towards a wrong solution/answer as you were looking in the wrong direction. If I understand you correctly, your question should have been "How do I create a file system / partition / volume that would appear in the side bar of my file manager?". It's answered here: Need to create a Partition after installing Ubuntu. – gertvdijk Jan 15 '13 at 13:02
  • i have put the name you suggested. but the linked question/answer only says: create free space and format it. Would that create a partition visible as asked? Aren't any specific formatting/settings needed for that? i mean those advanced settings you mentioned in previous comment on not setting any mount point (that would be the answer) –  Jan 15 '13 at 13:11
  • also, considering "Would (any) such partition be kept after reinstall? - Completely unrelated. This is an option in the installer." - what option is that –  Jan 15 '13 at 13:24