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Accepted
John Doe
Asked: 2018-06-18 06:23:28 +0800 CST

How to mount casper persistent partition in "read only" mode?

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my target is to use my Ubuntu "persistent" partition in read-only mode. In my boot menu, I would like to have ideally two optional commands, calling two different initrd.lz, one mounting casper in RW, the other mounting it just in a safe Read only mode. SO I can choose each time how to boot my system. In applications like home-banking I would like to browse internet with all my configurations and latest security updates, being also sure that all will be back as before after I shut down. Running just in live-mode, non persistent, I will instead need always to update all required security patches before connecting in internet....which is obviously a tedious procedure! In spite of my security paranoia, can someone help me? Alternative solutions are also well accepted! I changed the initrs.lz file, trying to mount casper in read-only mode...but I am a "beginner" and I failed. I also followed the suggestion in here: Mounting the persistence partition (casper-rw) read-only but it did not work...or I made something wrong! Thanks and cheers

grub2 live-usb partitioning mount persistence

2 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Guest User accounts for 16.04 and prior, are controlled by lightdm.conf.

    enter image description here

    For a grub2 booters with persistent casper-rw partitions, such as mkusb:

    Open casper-rw/upper/etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf and change:

    allow-guest=true

    Now there will be a Guest account.

    For Syslinux booters with persistent casper-rw files such as UNetbootin: First mount the casper-rw file:

    sudo mkdir /media/casper

sudo mount -o loop casper-rw /media/casper/

    Then edit casper/upper/etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf and change:

    allow-guest=true

    A guest account will be added to boot options.

    For 17.04 Gnome, LightDM has been replaced by GDM and GDM does not include a Guest session.

    The user can install LightDM in 17.04 Gnome using:

    sudo apt install lightdm

    The install process will ask to remove GDM.

    17.04 Gnome reports as being unconfined when in a guest session, caution applies.

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  2. Follow Up

    Modifying the Guest Account

    You may use an existing User Account, or create a new User Account, to use as a Live basis for customizing the Guest Session.

    Make a directory for guest session, if one does not already exist:

    sudo mkdir /etc/guest-session

    Create a symbolic link:

    sudo ln -s /home/{NAME} /etc/guest-session/skel

    Where {NAME} is the name of the User Account you wish to use as a basis.

    Any changes made to the user account will appear in the guest account, wallpaper, installed programs, etc.

    Any changes to the guest account will be deleted at end of the session.

    I should mention that I have been using mkusb to make the bootable drives.

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