Public SourceMage Discussion List

[Mads Laursen <smgl AT dossen.dk>]

On 14/04/06 05.30, Juuso Alasuutari wrote:
> On Thursday 13 April 2006 19:48, Mads Laursen wrote:
> > On 13/04/06 16.10, Juuso Alasuutari wrote:
> > [snip]
> >
> > > What I've described here is imho the last and most annoying thing
> > > standing between us and The Future(TM). Yes, kill the beast that is
> > > hotplug. So I'm asking for ideas on how we could at least ensure that 
> > > the
> > > network interfaces are consistent from boot one. Maybe add a script to
> > > the udev spell which automatically creates 00-binding.rules to carve the
> > > interface loading order in stone? I don't think it would be difficult.
> >
> > Perhaps the network configuration tool could do that? Either by adding
> > the setup to 00-binding.rules or to the .dev files in
> > /etc/sysconfig/network.
> 
> I'm not yet sure what tool would qualify for this. But I think we have to 
> add 
> udev rules. I don't see what use the .dev files would be, other than maybe 
> to 
> act as reminders in case something is lost.

The tool i was thinking of is our netconf command, in which you can
setup the networking.

> > How much magic can udev actually invoke when figuring out the names of
> > things?
> 
> I don't understand what you mean by this, could you explain?

I'm thinking that it might be nicer to have a MAC field in eth?.dev
and have the line in oo-binding.rules call a script that looks into
the .dev files for a match and figures out the name that way. It could
perhaps allow us to setup new default .dev files for newly added
interfaces.

The reason I'm suggesting this is, that I think it would be a lot
nicer to keep all the network(-card) config in /etc/sysconfig/network
instead of spreading it out over more files. And the format is also
simple enough that something like netconf actually works quite nicely.

In fact I'm thinking that maybe stuff like ifplugd and wpa_supplicant
would be nicer if their _per-interface_ config was also in eth?.dev,
if they are installed? Maybe have a plugin dir that netconf scans for
scripts that add features, and then each screen would display its
default options plus any that was added by a plugin?

> > Speaking of the configuration tool - gnome comes with some gui stuff
> > for configuring network and a number of other things. Anybody lokked
> > at the possibility of adding whatever glue is needed to let them work
> > on our setup?
> 
> Hmm, sounds to me a bit far fetched. Developing our own tools will probably 
> be 
> easier than solving various compatibility problems. And I think the 
> official 
> Source Mage gui is dialog. :) We don't want to enforce a graphical 
> environment.

The reason I looked at gnome-system-tools is that they claim to do
some xml-based frontend/backend stuff, so perhaps we could have a
backend that does what netconf does and suddenly we can choose to use
$EDITOR, netconf, or the gnome gui - all using the same config-files.
But of cause somebody has to do the backend, so unless I get
interested enough and find the time to do it, I guess it will just sit
there. BTW it is a required depend of gnome-profile and the only tools
that work in it is the boot (grub) editor and possibly the gdm
configurator (but that one doesn't understand how to ask for the root
password). 

> > Slightly OT: Is there some cannonical setup for networking with
> > laptops?
> >
> > currently I'm using wifi-radar to scan for networks and connect to
> > non-wpa networks and wpa_supplicant and ifup directly to connect to wpa
> > networks (including my own).
> 
> Same here, except that I only use wpa_supplicant. I haven't yet had need 
> for 
> anything non-WPA. I'm not even sure if my laptop _can_ connect to a normal 
> wifi without wpa_supplicant... Fujitsu-Siemens cr*p

On the other hand I think wpa_supplicant can handle all kinds of
network setups, so maybe I just need to improve the setup.

Do you have anything clever to run wpa_supplicant - init-script or
something? It does not seem to have anything included in the spell.

> > In my sort of ideal world the wired network should be configurable to
> > go up and down as the cable is plugged and unplugged (something like
> > ifplugd could probably do that) and the init system should handle this
> > somewhat more gracefully than today. The wireless should be managed by
> > wpa_supplicant, with some scripting to make bringing it up and down
> > nice and easy. Bonus points if it integrated nicely with some
> > gnome-friendly gui-stuff (yeah, sometimes I just want a point-n-shoot
> > interface).
> 
> You should really try ifplugd. I love it. I did some work on the spell and 
> now 
> it does what it's supposed to, although I still have some minor fixes in my 
> backpocket.
> Just install ifplugd and enable the init script, put your interface names 
> (e.g. INTERFACES="eth0 eth1") in /etc/ifplugd/ifplugd.conf, and select "Use 
> static driver" for your interface modules in netconf.
> You can also disable the UP_ON_BOOT option in netconf. Ifplugd will take 
> care 
> of connecting on boot and of course later, too, when the cable is plugged 
> or 
> unplugged.

It's been a while since I tried it last, so I'm actually installing it
right now. Done ;-) Haven't quite gotten it to play ball yet.

> Your thoughts about wireless management are basically the same I've had. It 
> would take a considerable amount of work to code a tool to do all that, but 
> I 
> think that's something Source Mage could/should have in the not-so-near 
> future.
> As I already said we don't do graphical stuff in SMGL, but I don't see why 
> a 
> wifi manager couldn't be done in bash. With a balanced mixture of 
> wpa_supplicant, cron, wireless-tools, ifplugd, and maybe dialog to add some 
> posh, it's totally possible.

Yeah that'd be nice. If it's done right (building something on top
of/inspired by netconf) it could also be made so that config could be
edited by hand.

And if some gui tool from gnome or fredesktop.org or whereever could
use a backend that edited the _same_ config, that wouldn't be so evil,
would it? Not that I'm a great lover of gui-configs, but for stuff
that one does not fiddle with too often it's nicer to use some kind of
tool and for a lot of stuff gui-tools ar nice.

> > Really nice would be a solution to make stuff like ssh-sessions and
> > incoming connections work as the connectivity changes.
> 
> With ifplugd this shouldn't be any problem. When link status changes it 
> automatically executes a certain script, which normally just executes ifup 
> or 
> ifdown. You can either modify that script or tell ifplugd to execute any 
> other file on link up/down.

The really difficult problem is really the IP-address of the machine.
For reasons of firewalling I have my wifi on a seperate subnet from
the wired, so there is no way packages for one goes over the other
without some magic. I saw a tool once that allowed you to mess with
the routing metrics, maybe that could be a start.

Anyway, thanks for the comments, I hope mine are also at least useful.

/dossen
-- 
The fantasy of gold, the fairy dream that the gold is there, at the end of
the rainbow, and will continue to be there for ever provided, naturally,
that you don't go and look.  This is known as Finance.
      -- Terry Pratchett, Going Postal

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