Re: Proposal: enable stateless persistant network interface names
On Sat, May 09, 2015 at 05:55:36PM -0700, Cameron Norman wrote:
> On Sat, May 9, 2015 at 2:36 PM, Josh Triplett <josh@joshtriplett.org> wrote:
> > Marvin Renich wrote:
> >> * Martin Pitt <mpitt@debian.org> [150509 05:27]:
> >> > TBH, hotpluggable USB network adapters which change all the time sound
> >> > like a corner case in a server world where you have hand-written
> >> > config files referring to interface names. They are of course common
> >> > on the client side, but there stable interface names don't matter at
> >> > all. But see below.
> >>
> >> I disagree that stable interface names do not matter for USB adaptors
> >> for consumer laptops. I have owned two laptops where the on-board WiFi
> >> adaptor was too new to have reliable Linux drivers until 6-12 months
> >> after I purchased them. While waiting for the Linux drivers, I used a
> >> USB WiFi dongle that has good kernel support. I have plugged the
> >> adaptor into different USB ports based on where my laptop was situated
> >> wrt varied surroundings. I suspect (with no real data to back it up)
> >> that the biggest use of USB WiFi dongles on consumer machines is when
> >> the on-board WiFi doesn't work for some reason (too new or broken). In
> >> this case, it is often the main internet connection and a stable name is
> >> important.
> >
> > Why? What does a stable name matter in the case you mentioned?
> >
> > Were you actually using ifupdown to manage the varied set of wireless
> > networks? Because if not, then the name shouldn't matter.
>
> Does networkd handle this situation well?
Yes. It has an arbitrary matching mechanism based on various attributes
of interfaces and networks. While you *can* match the interface name,
you don't need to, and you have many other options.
- Josh Triplett
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