Red Hat

Hi Folks!

I accidentally overwrote in /etc/fstab file. Can you guys please tell me, what impact it would have created, when I restarted the machine(RHEL6).
I executed this command :
# blkid /dev/vda5 > /etc/fstab

It will not boot.

I powered off the Virtual Machine and started again, it started, but I don't know the state of machine after start.
Because I had to leave, so I am curious to know.

Any storage that is mounted by the OS uses /etc/fstab to control where it is mounted and with what parameters set.

Essentially, nothing will mount, and as said previously, your node won't boot.

Backups rock!

But it did, that's strange after power-off and starting it again, it started again. Is there a backup file or so that OS creates it for itself.

Just spun up a CentOS box to check, and you're right, the box does boot, you just can't do much with it as it does not have anything mounted filesystem-wise.

The good news is that you could recreate the /etc/fstab file manually and as long as it matched the original, with everything mounted in the correct place, you could carry on using your server as if nothing had happened, after a reboot of course.

Thanks a lot!
that was useful, lets hope we will get more informative answers.