On Wednesday, June 08, 2011 09:45:41 AM Andy Mastbaum wrote:
> Nay indeed. I'd also like to note that GUI tools are not so helpful when 
> you're not running X on a server.

That I'll agree with; thus the cnetworkmanager package wishful thinking (upstream isn't shipping it, at least not yet, and it's not in EPEL.  Haven't check ELrepo or RPMforge yet.)  It allows full functionality in the CLI.

> I have had nothing but trouble with this thing. It sometimes changes 
> from static to DHCP addresses (making computers disappear)

I'm assuming you filed a bugzilla upstream?  Also, in your ifcfg-ethX files you have the ability (that is fully documented in upstream's documentation) to tell NM to not manage a particular interface, but just pull it up.  It's just a matter of learning a newer way of doing things. 

> and makes 
> even slightly nontrivial configuration (multiple interfaces on different 
> subnets, iptables NAT) difficult or impossible. The first thing I do 
> when I set up a new box is delete NetworkManager. (For remote install, 
> manual package selection should let you disable it.)

My EL6 test box has four eth ports, and I had zero trouble getting them working, on different subnets.  But I also thoroughly read the docs and their notes before installing, and noticed the 'Configure Network' button on the hostname dialog while I installed using VNC.  Also, this install was an EL6.1, not 6.0, install.  
 
> It's fine for 3G on laptops or whatever, but that's not really the 
> target market of SL. 

Target market?  It's for scientific and other users who want an EL distribution.  That's not exclusively servers.  I'm looking at possibly some desktop installs with LABview and MatLab here.  Both of those are supported on upstream's workstation offering.  One of those desktops will be a laptop.  No wireless (we're a radio astronomy observatory; aint' no wifi supposed to be here!), and out far enough in the boonies that there isn't good 3G either.

But do realize that the following statement is in the upstream docs:
"The Network Administration Tool is now deprecated and will be replaced by NetworkManager during the lifetime of ... 6."  That means at some point it will be bye-bye system-config-network-tui.  I hope they've gotten a text-mode nm-connection-editor by then.

Also note: for those who are having issues with network interfaces not coming up post-install,  upstream's documentation addresses this, too, in the installation document.  If you're installing headless, you really should use the GUI installer over VNC, and on the dialog where you set the hostname is a button to configure network connections during install.  I used this installing my testbed system (which is not SL, but is upstream EL6), over VNC, and everything came up as it should during first boot.  Oh, and first boot was to runlevel 3, not 5.  It's set to init to 5 now, because I actually use that box as a desktop, too.  

Even though this box will detect the NICs in a nondeterministic fashion (it totally depends on which one initializes first!) I've not had any wandering connections.  I specifically tested install with this box since it does have such 'randomizing' in device detect order.  Hrmph, right now it has the boot hard disk sitting at /dev/sdaa (not a typo; two a's).  Next boot it's anyone's guess where it will come up; and that's ok, the box runs just fine, and all filesystems are mounted properly.

And I chose meaningful names, too, for the various subnets.  Makes things pretty simple.  I don't look forward to replacing a NIC, but, then again, I would have that issue with a manual config, too.