The case against NetworkManager

[Andrew Parker]

On 10/9/07, Timothy Murphy <tim at birdsnest.maths.tcd.ie> wrote:
> I see that there is a proposal to make NM (Network Manager)
> a standard feature of Fedora-8, replacing system-config-network
> in its various forms.

Another issue that I have with NM (which I actually quite like, when
it works) is the following:

1.  Network mount points get crippled when switching from one lan to
another.  This could be fixed by unmounting then remounting
afterwards, but remounting may not be always appropriate.  Not to
mention the fact that unmounting may fail or bork something else.

2.  VPNs have a similar problem.  Restarting them too may work, but
again may not be appropriate.  We could do with VPNs being associated
with one or more network configurations.

3.  Sometimes I want both a wired and wireless connection. Admittedly
this is not very often, but I haven't found a way to do that with NM.

4.  I have some hosts with multiple wired NICs, not all of which are
up at the same time.  Is there a way to configure NM to have multiple
wired profiles?

I have to admit that I am guilty of not knowing enough about NM to
know if any of these are on the roadmap, but if they're not then I
will have to continue to use my own scripts that do this for me - in a
much more inelegant and restricted manner.

So far as I'm concerned, NM can be made the default, but I will be Mr
Cranky Pants from Crankyville, Crankyshire if I lose the ability to
revert to system-config-network.