Tom H wrote: > Joe Riel wrote: > > $ grep -v '^\#' /etc/network/interfaces > > > > auto lo > > iface lo inet loopback > > allow-hotplug eth0 > > > > Should I then do > > > > sudo ifdown eth0 > > sudo ifup etho0 > > > > Hmm. That doesn't work: > > > > $ sudo ifdown eth0 > > ifdown: interface eth0 not configured It doesn't work because the file is missing the 'iface eth0 inet dhcp' line that would tell ifup and ifdown what to do there. But I think it is missing that line because of Network Manager. See why below. > > I haven't done anything in particular to configure my > > installation of Squeeze for the local network; just accepted > > the defaults. Unfortunately there is disagreement on what the defaults should be and therefore they are set to a compromise that is often suboptimal. (Is that a polite way of saying I don't like the defaults and always change them?) > Your "/etc/network/interfaces" is incorrect. > If you're using NM, "allow-hotplug eth0" shouldn't be included. > If you're not using NM, "iface eth0 inet dhcp" should be added. Mostly agree except that I believe it is okay to have the auto and allow-hotplug lines only. And I think the configuration specifically is due to the action of Network Manager's postinst script. See this bug report for the details, especially comments related to #49 that I have linked to here. http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=530024#49 Since the above config showed to us removed all commented out lines we can't see if there is a line #NetworkManager#iface eth0 inet dhcp in there or not. I am thinking there is. And that left the lonely 'allow-hotplug eth0' line behind by itself. It's a mess! What do I do? I only use wicd (instead of NetworkManager) on mobile devices (laptops) that use wifi for network connectivity. I personally do not have any non-mobile devices that use anything other than a wired network connection. For all non-mobile devices I remove network-manager completely and use only the traditional ifupdown configuration with all three of 'auto eth0', 'allow-hotplug eth0' and 'iface eth0 inet dhcp' lines. And for servers with fixed IP addresses I assign the IP interface address without using dhcp. Bob
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