Sometimes you want your computer to load external hard drives automatically on boot, e.g. if it gets rebooted accidentally, recovers from power failure, etc. Here’s how to do that on Ubuntu 14.04.
First, create a desired directory for your mount point using a command like:
mkdir /your/mount/point
Then, while the external hard drive is connected and the computer is on, find the drive’s UUID by running the command
blkid
This will list all block devices, including your external hard drive. Note the UUID and the type of the drive.
Then, open /etc/fstab and add a line like
UUID=<your uuid> /your/mount/point <your mount point> users,defaults 0 0
Save and close the file, then test it by rebooting and perhaps logging in from another machine via SSH. Your drive should mount automatically!