Mounting your first volume

Adding an SFTP connection

Choose SFTP, then give the host, the port (22 unless you know otherwise), your username, and either a password or a private key. Keys from ~/.ssh are offered directly; nothing is copied out of that folder.

The host key prompt matters

On first connect Mountit shows the server's host key fingerprint and asks you to confirm it. This is not a formality to click through. Compare it against what the server administrator published, or against ssh-keyscan your-host run from a machine you already trust.

If that fingerprint ever changes afterwards, Mountit refuses to connect and tells you. That is the correct behaviour — an unexpected host key change is indistinguishable from someone sitting between you and your server. Confirm with whoever runs it before accepting the new one.

Where credentials go

Into the Keychain, protected by the Secure Enclave where the hardware has one. The Rust core is handed a short-lived credential at connect time and stores nothing itself. For OAuth providers the sign-in happens in the system browser, so your provider password is never typed into Mountit at all.

What the cache does on first browse

The first time you open a directory, Mountit goes to the server. After that the listing is answered locally and refreshed in the background, which is why the second visit is instant and the first is not. Reads pull ahead of where you are; writes return as soon as they are durable on your disk and upload behind you.

That write-back queue survives a disconnect and a restart. A save is not lost because the network dropped between saving and uploading — but it is also not on the server the instant the progress bar disappears. If you need to know a file has landed, the volume's activity view tells you when the queue is empty.

Offline pinning

Right-click a folder and choose Keep offline. Its contents are fetched and kept in the encrypted local cache, so they open with no network at all. Everything else stays remote.