netdev - Re: Network Device Naming mechanism and policy

lists.openwall.net		lists / announce owl-users owl-dev john-users john-dev passwdqc-users yescrypt popa3d-users / oss-security kernel-hardening musl sabotage tlsify passwords / crypt-dev xvendor / Bugtraq Full-Disclosure linux-kernel linux-netdev linux-ext4 linux-hardening linux-cve-announce PHC
Open Source and information security mailing list archives

Hash Suite: Windows password security audit tool. GUI, reports in PDF.

[<prev] [next>] [<thread-prev] [thread-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Message-ID: <20090331140733.GF6321@e-circ.dyndns.org>
Date:	Tue, 31 Mar 2009 16:07:34 +0200
From:	Kurt Van Dijck <kurt.van.dijck@....be>
To:	Matt Domsch <Matt_Domsch@...l.com>
Cc:	netdev@...r.kernel.org, linux-hotplug@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: Network Device Naming mechanism and policy

My idea as a user, having configured some servers:

On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 05:46:17PM +0200, Matt Domsch wrote:
> 
> Problem:  Users expect on-motherboard NICs to be named eth0..ethN.  This can be difficult to achieve.

with kernel point of view, there should be no preference. If users
expect some numbering, I believe udev provides all the tools.
> 
> Ethernet device names are initially assigned by the kernel, and may be
> changed by udev or nameif in userspace.  The initial name assigned by
> the kernel is in monotonically increasing order, starting with eth0.
> In this instance, the enumeration directly leads to an assigned name.
the problem here is the monotonic increasing order. I never rename ethX
back to the monotonic ethX numbering. IMHO, renaming eth0 to eth1 sounds
redundant.
I rename ethx to lan, wan, wlan, remote, lan0, lan1, ...
This naming _cannot_ conflict.
> 
> 
>       To ease this complication, SMBIOS 2.6 includes a mechanism for
>       BIOS to specify its expected ordering of devices, for naming
>       purposes.  Tools such as biosdevname use this information.
I'd preferrably not rely on bios tools, not every system has a (stable) bios.
> 
> 

--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe netdev" in
the body of a message to majordomo@...r.kernel.org
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html