system-config-network "activate", "deactivate" button greyed out

[Marko Vojinovic]

On Thursday 06 August 2009 01:52:38 daniel shi wrote:
> what i do now is edit the interface in
> system-config-network, save the changes, then activate the interface in
> network manager. this works, but somehow is a little inconvenient.

If you use Network Manager, this is precisely how it is meant to work, as has 
been explained several times on the list (you might want to search the 
archives).

In short, the system-config-network utility is used for configuring network 
devices. Activating them is done from the application that controls their 
usage --- if the device is controlled by Network Manager (a checkbox in the 
settings), then only Network Manager can and should activate it. However, if 
you use network service instead of Network Manager, the checkbox should be off 
in the settings, and activation should be done via "service network start" in 
the command line, or automatically on boot.

The "activate" and "deactivate" buttons from s-c-n should also work in the 
latter case, but I never liked them, they always felt somehow too clumsy for 
my taste.

The "edit" button in NM is greyed out because the configuration is (and should 
be) done from s-c-n, not NM itself. However, I agree that this "edit" button 
could be made to open s-c-n, which would be an intuitive and good solution. I 
don't know why this has not been configured like that already.

HTH, :-)
Marko