[CentOS] A question about 7

[Les Mikesell]

On Tue, Jan 14, 2014 at 7:17 PM, Warren Young <warren at etr-usa.com> wrote:
>
> I don't know about "less consistent", but I always considered it a
> feature in Linux vs the BSDs or big iron Unix that I could always count
> on the first network interface being "eth0".

What does 'first' mean?  And the same one isn't consistently first.

> I get that network interfaces can move around on you, but I thought that
> was why they started putting the MAC address in the ifcfg-eth? scripts.
> What problem did that not solve, that we had to switch to this new system?

The problem is when you clone a disk and ship it to a location with
'hands-on' support that doesn't know linux to install in a new chassis
that will arrive there at the same time.   Somehow you have to get
someone to put the 4 network cables in the right NICs before anything
can connect.   With things tied to MAC addresses that you don't know
ahead of time, nothing will work.

> Now I have to remember which *PCI slot* my Ethernet card is in when I
> run "ifconfig" unless I want to dig through the full listing.

Yes, but that's something you _can_ know.

-- 
  Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com