SSHFS - Mount remote filesystem over SSH

I just discovered SSHFS. I haven't tried it yet but I think this would let me use my local development tools on my VPS since the files are 'local'. I know SCP exists but this seems more intuitive.

Feb 23 · 3 months ago · 👍 lykso, norayr

7 Comments ↓

🚂 MrSVCD · Feb 23 at 16:58:

SSHFS makes SFTP into a equivalent of Windows File Sharing/SMB/CIFS and is great way to transfer files between *nix systems

🐙 norayr · Feb 23 at 19:25:

yes, it is an amazing tool, i used it for years.

however for having something mounted always, it is not that convenient solution.

today i use wireguard vpn to my server and mount the remote directories via nfs.

this is way more fast and stable and handles reconnects or changes of network connection immediately.

📷 sjlxndr · Feb 24 at 10:09:

it should work just fine but the latency can be annoying like @norayr said. the solution they suggest sounds solid to me, though NFS can choke kinda hard in terms of having to force-unmount etc if you lose connection. that's probably an issue with sshfs tho too and not a big deal in any case

🦎 grevil · Feb 25 at 01:14:

If you're interested in using a remote machine as your build server during dev (for bandwidth or processing power) you might also like to try https://mutagen.io/documentation/synchronization .

With SSHFS I think it loads the file over the network each time you read from it. With mutagen you have a local copy that gets pushed across each time you change it. Feels quicker in my experience.

🐙 norayr · Feb 26 at 14:54:

nfs remounts itself when the connection is back very fast. sshfs i think won't remount. but hey, i like sshfs and sometimes use. let's say i use sshfs to sync photos from my "phones" or on some devices i don't want to have nfs+wireguard on.

📷 sjlxndr · Feb 26 at 19:17:

last time I used NFS in production was probably 10ya so maybe implementation has changed. also it was on aix so probably different from whatever Linux rocks anyway. in any case sounds like your photo sync use case might be a candidate for rsync, no need to mount anything, but that's a choice, and you may have good reasons for mounting

💀 requiem · Apr 11 at 12:18:

SSHFS is fantastic. I use it to mount remote folders over my home VPN, super handy for development. The only annoying thing was that it regularly got stuck on MacOS, and I had to force unmount / remount quite often.

I ended up switching over to CloudMounter to achieve the same but with a GUI and a bit of more error handling than just running the SSHFS command. Still, in principle, I am sold.