On Tue, Dec 3, 2013 at 6:36 PM, ~Stack~ <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Sorry for the absence. Sunday/Mondays are my busy days. I did run into a
> very confusing outcome (posted below) and I also responded to all the
> questions in one email so that things didn't get too confusing in
> separate emails.
>
> Thanks for all the advice and help so far!
>
>
>
> On 12/01/2013 10:36 AM, olli hauer wrote:

>> Could it be that '%packages --nobase' isn't pulling in something
>> that's needed? Since you can run 'ifup eth0' to bring up the network,
>> all that's necessary must be installed.
>>
>> Have you tried 'service network restart'? Does that bring up your nic?
>
> Well now. That is interesting. This is consistent even with a fresh
> kickstart install.
> $ service network restart
> Shutting down interface eth0:      [  OK  ]
> Shutting down loopback interface:  [  OK  ]
> Bringing up loopback interface:    [  OK  ]
> Bringing up interface eth0:
> Determining IP information for eth0... failed; no link present.  Check
> cable?  [FAILED]
> $ ifup eth0
> Determining IP information for eth0... done.
>
> Errr...what? *scratches head* What exactly is 'ifup eth0' doing that
> 'service network restart' isn't?

It's running significantly later. Even dumb switches, and supported
network drivers, can tike time to recognize  the available MAC
address. This is especially the case with DHCP, which requires
communications all the way upstream to whatever DHCP server is in
place.

Try hard-coding the network configuration, temporarily, and see if it
comes up consistently. Then you'll know if it's the availability of
DHCP that's the issue.



>
>> Have you tried installing with '%packages' rather than with '%packages
>> --nobase'?
>
> I have.
>
>> I skimmed through the two lists
>> but couldn't spot anything that might help, sorry.
>
> Thanks for looking. Thank you all for your help and input! I do
> appreciate it!
>
>> You shouldn't need to install NM in order to get networking to come up.
>
> I would think so too, but so far the only thing that has gotten DHCP
> working on boot has been installing NetworkManager. It is very strange.

NetworkManager is a monstrous cluster!@#$ of bloatware, and is
typically configured to keep trying to re-establish your network
configuration even if it fails at boot time or is lost at some time.
So I'm not shocked that it helped. It's also bulkier than needed:
simply starting and loading it may delay the boot process enough to
allow the network ports to be available for DHCP.