Mounting & Unmounting an ISO in Linux

Mounting an ISO

To mount an ISO in Linux, you need to follow these steps :

Firstly, you need to create a directory where you will be mounting the ISO. You can do so using the command :

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/disk

Next, we mount the ISO file using the command :

sudo mount -o loop [filename].iso /mnt/disk

If you get an error saying that loop is not up, first load the loop module and then repeat the mount command. To load the loop module, use the command :

sudo modprobe loop

Note that you can always use TAB key to auto-complete the filename. -o loop is used to denote the mounted ISO file is a loop device. A loop device is a pseudo-device which writes/reads from a file rather than a hardware.

Unmounting an ISO

To unmount an ISO file, use the command :

sudo umount /mnt/disk

Use the following command if you are getting an error :

sudo umount -f /mnt/disk

Note that it is 'umount' and not 'unmount'.