Configuring A Network Connection Manually - Novell LINUX ENTERPRISE SERVER 11 - ADMINISTRATION Administration Manual

Types of Network Connections
Both traditional configuration and NetworkManager can handle network connections
with a wireless network (with WEP, WPA-PSK, and WPA-Enterprise access), dial-
up and wired networks using DHCP and static configuration. They also support
connection through VPN.
NetworkManager tries to keep your computer connected at all times using the best
connection available. If the network cable is accidentally disconnected, it tries to
reconnect. It can find the network with the best signal strength from the list of your
wireless connections and automatically use it to connect. To get the same function-
ality with ifup, a great deal of configuration effort is required.
17.6 Configuring a Network
Manual configuration of the network software should always be the last alternative.
Using YaST is recommended. However, this background information about the network
configuration can also assist your work with YaST.
When the kernel detects a network card and creates a corresponding network interface,
it assigns the device a name depending on the order of device discovery, or order of
the loading of the kernel modules. The default kernel device names are only predictable
in very simple or tightly controlled hardware environments. Systems which allow adding
or removing hardware during runtime or support automatic configuration of devices
cannot expect stable network device names assigned by the kernel across reboots.
However, all system configuration tools rely on persistent interface names. The problem
is solved by udev. The udev persistent net generator (/etc/udev/rules.d/
75-persistent-net-generator.rules) generates a rule matching the hard-
ware (using its hardware address by default) and assigns a persistently unique interface
for the hardware. The udev database of network interfaces is stored in the file /etc/
udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules. Every line in the file describes
one network interface and specifies its persistent name. System administrators can
change the assigned names by editing the NAME="" entries. The persistent rules can
also be modified using YaST.
240 Administration Guide
Connection Manually