User directories are stored (distributed) on many file servers on the campus network. AFS does this distribution and management, including backup, so you do not need to know the exact machine on which your files have been stored. Rather than a fixed location, you get a fixed path to your user file space, or home directory.

Quota

Your home directory has an assigned size limit, or quota, of 300MB, which is the amount of disk space you have for storing files. Whatever you store in your home directory is backed up nightly. If you exceed your quota, you will receive error messages and will not be able to save files or run software. You will have to clean out files and/or save them to external media (see Managing File Space).

Permanent storage is in your AFS home directory on the network, not on the local hard drive of the lab workstation! Saving to the local drive is permitted for the session only. The local drive is erased at logout.

Location of your User Space (Home Directory)

AFS creates a hierarchy of directories where all software, user files, and other file collections are stored. When you log in, you are automatically placed in your home directory, which is several levels down from the top of the file tree (see figures below and in Working with Directories ).

Your home directory is as accessible as the folders and files on your local computer's hard disk. In fact, on campus Windows machines, the path to your home directory has been mapped (shortcut) to the K: drive, so it acts just like your local C: drive. When you save files to the K: drive, you are saving to your user space in AFS.

On Solaris and Linux, the command pwd at the prompt will show you that you are in your home directory in AFS. The command cd ~ (~ is the symbol for your home directory) will always return you there, and when you save files, they are saved by default to your user space in AFS.

The path to one's home directory originates in the root /afs directory, which encompasses other sites in the world that run AFS. Unity (unity.ncsu.edu) and Eos (eos.ncsu.edu) are among those sites, or cells, and they in turn branch into more directories, one of which is the users directory, where home directories reside.

Most user home directories are located in the Unity cell. You can type/select unity or unity.ncsu.edu; they are the same:

/afs/unity/users/a-z/loginid/

Some older engineering accounts for faculty and staff are in the Eos cell. You can type/select eos or eos.ncsu.edu; they are the same:

/afs/eos/users/a-z/loginid/

The top level, /afs, is mapped to the J: drive on Windows. The Unity /users directory contains subdirectories from /a to /z in which individual home directories are grouped alphabetically by login ID, e.g., /afs/unity/users/j/jqpublic/ on UNIX and J:\unity\users\j\jqpublic\ on Windows.

An example home directory on Eos is /afs/eos/users/x/xman/ on UNIX and J:\eos\users\x\xman\ on Windows. The alphabetical organization is by the first letter of your userID, not your last name.

The following figures show the path to the user xman's home directory in the Eos cell, both from a UNIX computer and a Windows computer. On UNIX computers, you list (ls) or change directories (cd) to move through subdirectories. On Windows computers, you simply open folders (see Working with Directories).

Your own home directory is one of many user directories in AFS, and only you alone can access it, as the "Permission Denied" messages indicate in the figures below (see AFS Permissions).

Path to xman's home directory on UNIX (/afs/eos/users/x/xman/):

eos% cd /afs

eos% cd /afs/eos/
	  

adm            dist         project      source    www
cds.afs.proxy  engrwww      public       system
contrib        info         sadm         users
courses        lockers      service      wsadmin


eos% cd /afs/eos/users/

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

eos% cd /afs/eos/users/x/

xblin   xhu2    xli     xliu2   xman    xwang1  xwang5 
xhu     xiong   xliang  xma     xmin    xwang2  xyuan

eos% cd /afs/eos/users/x/xman/  
	  
xman: Permission denied

Path to xman's home directory on Windows (J:\eos\users\x\xman\):

Related Resources

E115 Course:

• The File Tree
• Pathnames
• pwd

Home Directory, or K:Drive (from Guide, PDF)

On Solaris/Linux:
quota
displays user's home directory quota from anywhere in AFS.

On Windows:
Right-click K: drive and select AFS -> Volume/Partition -> Properties

Purchase Additional Quota

Protect Your Quota!

Do not share your quota by giving someone your password. You can share your account space in other ways (see AFS Permissions). However, be aware that you are giving up quota for someone else's use.

Location of Your User Volume

You use a path to get to your information, but that information actually resides in an AFS volume with a fixed quota (see AFS Overview).

It is not necessary for you to know where your user volume is stored on a server because AFS finds it automatically. However, if there is maintenance or downtime scheduled for servers, you may want to know if your volume is affected. To find out on which server your volume currently resides:

fs whereis

On Windows:
Right-click K: drive -> AFS -> Show File Server

Definitions

AFS
cell
file server
home directory
path(name)
quota
relative path(name)
root directory

Information Technology and Engineering Computer Services (ITECS)
College of Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695
Comments to eoshelp@ncsu.edu. URL: http://www.eos.ncsu.edu/

This support page is for students, faculty, and
staff at North Carolina State University.