Narcis Garcia writes:
> Perhaps there is some kernel parameter to change default behavior from boot?
> I'm not looking a solution for a single installation but for hundreds of
> my users.

If you use puppet or another similar way to deploy to a large set of
computers, then you can deploy a suitable udev file and script to all
computers easily. In /etc/udev/rules.d, you need a file that matches usb
sticks and runs the program. The script can either just mount (and either
rely on fstab or supply noatime itself), or it can sleep for ten seconds,
then scan for mounted sticks and run mount -o remount,noatime in order to
add noatime to any sticks the user mounts on directories other than /mnt.

That said, most people use the default file system so as to keep their
mac/windows compatibility. How many of those hundreds of users have
bothered to reformat their sticks? I suspect this change just isn't worth
any effort.

Arnt