Re: Ethernet connect problem

[Matthew Dawson <matthewjd@gmail.com>]

Hello,

> >> my /etc/network/interfaces file contains
> >
> > # This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
> > # and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).
> >
> > # The loopback network interface
> > auto lo
> > iface lo inet loopback
> >
> > # The primary network interface
> > auto eth0
> > iface eth0 inet dhcp
> >
> >
> > i dont know wht this dhcp is bt I havnt used this earlier and I am under my
> institute's(nitrkl.ac.in) firewall
> and at the installation time it automatically configured my laptop as
> phani.nitrkl.ac.in (I doubt this)
> Is my institute firewall making problem?
> As far as I know my institute supports  automatic DHCP configuration
As mentioned before, you should comment out the lines about eth0.  So your /etc/network/interfaces file should contain afterwards:

# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# The primary network interface
#auto eth0
#iface eth0 inet dhcp



Afterwards run the command:
/etc/init.d/network-manager restart

And see if that works.

For others who come looking for a solution, the problem is network manager (the tool gnome uses to allow users to easily configure their network settings) ignores any interface you explicitly configure in /etc/network/interfaces.  By commenting out the lines and restarting the service, network manager will begin managing eth0.  This also applies if you use any other desktop environment which uses network manager as its backend.

Matthew