# can no longer loop mount ISO file

## darkphader

Trying to loop mount an ISO file which I've done a gazillion times previously and it no longer works.

In the past I had always built the loop device as a module but for some (possibly good) reason it was currently built-in. I decided to rebuild the kernel with the loop device as a module (and made sure it was loaded) but that did not solve the problem.

Of course I've tried several different ISO files and mount points, none work.

```
mount -o loop /path/to/isofile/isofile.iso /mnt/loop
```

 simply provides this message most likely due to the fact that I didn't specify ro in the mount option:

```
mount: /dev/loop0 is write-protected, mounting read-only
```

 however the file does not get loop mounted - no data in the mount point.

Running gentoo-sources-3.19.2 and sys-apps/util-linux-2.26.1-r1.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

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## i92guboj

If the mount if failing, dmesg should show something.

There's also the chance that it's a multisession disk and the first session is empty.

Or maybe it's not iso9660, but udf or something else. In that case you might need to add support for that in the kernel.

Don't really know, it's been long since I bothered with this stuff for the last time. In the rare occasions when I need to handle an iso file I just unpack it with 7z in a temporal directory. I admit it's not the most straightforward way to handle it, but optical drivers are hardly practical for anything, much less in linux where burning barely works.

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## darkphader

I've tried with several known good ISO files (several Linux install and live images for one). All dmesg provides is:

```
[ 2300.839262] ISO 9660 Extensions: Microsoft Joliet Level 3

[ 2300.839290] ISO 9660 Extensions: RRIP_1991A
```

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## toralf

 *darkphader wrote:*   

>  however the file does not get loop mounted - no data in the mount point.

 Happens for me for an ISO image from Lenovos web side for a BIOS update.

However mounting a minimal iso from Gentoo works fine :

```
$ sudo mount -o loop,ro ~/Downloads/install-amd64-minimal-20150319.iso /mnt/media/

$ ls /mnt/media/

gentoo.efimg  gentoo.efimg.mountPoint  image.squashfs  isolinux  livecd  README.txt

$ sudo umount /mnt/media/

```

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## darkphader

None of my ISO files mount.

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## darkphader

It seems the system recognizes what the files are (hence the proper dmesg output) yet the mount really never occurs.

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## darkphader

Any ideas? I'm losing hair rapidly...

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## darkphader

May be a systemd situation. I get this in the journal:

```
ISO 9660 Extensions: Microsoft Joliet Level 3

ISO 9660 Extensions: RRIP_1991A

systemd[1]: Unit mnt-loop.mount is bound to inactive unit. Stopping, too.
```

Filed a bug just in case it is a systemd issue and the devs can figure it out.

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## musv

I  have the same problem. Could be so nice to reveal the link to the bug report?

Found this:

https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=89383

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## darkphader

My bug is here:

https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=544704

But marked as resolved due to duplicate:

https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=541402

So it is a systemd issue.

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## musv

Btw. I found a workaround: 

I just mounted the iso file to /dev/shm.

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## musv

Went back to systemd-218. Everything works again.

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## darkphader

I applied the patch linked to in the bug report. Works fine.

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