Re: nm-edit? Static entries?

[Dan Williams <dcbw redhat com>]

On Wed, 2006-06-21 at 12:14 -0400, Pat Suwalski wrote:
> Jeff Moore wrote:
> > I am hoping that something like the nm-edit suggestion below is in the
> > works or is already implemented. I don't have a very good knowledge of
> > the inner workings of NM so I would like to ask all of you if there is
> > something in place that would allow an individual to statically set an
> > interfaces properties? 
> 
> I have this planned, with a nice little UI for it in my mind, but it 
> needs some networkmanager work. The applet itself currently does not 
> store any IP settings, and I think the backend itself only does DHCP at 
> the moment.
> 
> > I have little to no programming experience but this is something that I
> > am so interested in that I would be willing to learn. Any tips pointers
> > etc.? 
> 
> Essentially, the backend would have to call out to "ifconfig <ip> 
> <netmask> up" and then call "route add default gw <foo>" and then edit 
> the /etc/resolv.conf file to add DNS. Next, the dbus communication 
> between the backend and the applet would need to support transferring 
> those settings, and the applet would need to store them. Adding editing 
> to the currently-alpha-grade editor wouldn't be too bad after that.

Here's the plan (so far) for NM 0.7 for static IP addresses and system
wide configuration.

First, we have to strike a balance for the applet between simplicity and
configuration.  For wireless, we obviously allow the user to input
configuration information directly.  With WPA and all its options, this
is getting overloaded.

Second, the config for wireless makes sense, because we _know_ what item
it applies to.  NM can't know what config to use for wired networks when
you plug in the cable because that stuff isn't automatic.  So, people
ask for "profiles", because obviously they know what network they are
plugging into.  But since NM doesn't know this, and since these
"profiles" require a bit of work to set up, I don't think wired
configuration settings should be in the applet.  The same goes for some
bluetooth stuff; we're not going to put the BT config stuff into the
applet.

So; I think at the moment, the plan is this [1]:

1) If you don't have any wired configuration set up, NM will use DHCP on
the wired interface as normal.

2) If you do set up a configuration for it, the applet will show a
submenu from the interface's menu item.  This submenu will contain what
people want seem to want to call "profiles".  If the default profile
fails to connect, NM will do nothing and the user must choose the
profile to use. [2]

3) The configuration will be done either by some tool like 'nm-edit' or
by the system-specific configuration tools.

4) By default, all configurations will be user-specific and stored in
GConf or KConfig or whatever

5) If the user so desires, and if the user has administrator/root privs,
he/she may "publish" the configuration as a system-wide configuration.
It will then show up in the applet's menu and be available
_at__system__boot__time__.  The same goes for wireless configs too.

6) Since system-wide configurations will be stored in
distribution-specific ways, its probably somewhat undefined how an
NM-specific editing tool would push the config information to each
distros config files.

In the end, if you need profiles, you're going to have to accept some
amount of screwage here.  In NM 0.7, that screwage will take the form of
requiring user intervention if you don't want to use the default
profile.

Dan

[1] some bits are up for debate

[2] _don't_ suggest reverse-arping a known configured MAC address to
figure out what config settings to use, because that's not going to
happen.  It has too many problems and has been discussed here before.