network manager has gone crazy

[lee]

Tim <ignored_mailbox at yahoo.com.au> writes:

> Tim:
>> > _EXACTLY_ how are you giving it the data?
>
> Lee:
>> I was using system-config-network and editing some files when it didn't
>> work.
>
> Well, unless things have changed, then you're fighting two things
> against each other.
>
> System-config-network directly controls the network settings.
> NetworkManager does whatever it does, dynamically.
>
> NetworkManager will clobber settings set elsewhere, unless you
> specifically configure NetworkManager to leave them alone.  You'd need
> to that through NetworkManager's own interface, or through the
> configuration files that it pays attention to.

Yes and where is this interface and where are the files?

>> > * Are you configuring network manager, through its own interface?
>
>> I thought system-config-network is the interface for it.  Now my theory
>> is that it is perhaps not and that networkmanager conflicts with it.
>
> It isn't.

It's the only half-way obvious thing I could find.

>> Where does networkmanager store it's configuration? 
>
> I can never remember.  And the lack of useful documentation doesn't
> help.
>
>> How do you configure it?
>
> If using Gnome, there's a desktop taskbar icon for NetworkManager, it
> lets you pick a network out of a list of available networks (if there
> are several to choose from), and there's an edit connections menu item
> to customise particular choices.  They could be fully automatic (the
> client is remotely set by a DHCP server), or you can choose to allow
> some things to be set by a DHCP server, other things to be manually set,
> or everything manually set.

I'm not using gnome.  These so-called desktop-environments aren't doing
anything for me but getting in the way.

> That said, prior experience has shown that NetworkManager is geared
> towards automatically configuring DHCP clients by the DHCP server.  If
> you don't have a DHCP server, it can be easier to disable
> NetworkManager, and use the old system-config-network, rather than try
> to set up manual configurations through NetworkManager.  I do not know
> if this situation has changed.

I have had the same impression.  It might be nice to have on a mobile
computer with arbitrary internet connections *if* it works.
Unfortunately, the installer doesn't leave you a choice.

Obviously, networkmanager is unable to handle a change in the
configuration, so the only situation in which it /might/ work is when
you don't touch it and use DHCP.  Of course, if I was using DHCP, the
DHCP server would run on the same computer as networkmanager, and that
probably won't work, either --- especially not during the installation.

Fedora needs to fix the dependencies on networkmanager when you look at
what would be removed when you remove networkmanager.

> If you do not use DHCP, then I'm not sure how, nor why, NetworkManager
> would be fiddling with things.  Other than, perhaps, automatically
> assigning a random link-local address to the ethernet interface, because
> no DHCP server assigned one.

The installer forced me to use it, and networkmanager seems to be still
trying to enforce an outdated configuration when it is enabled.  That's
why I keep asking how to change it and where it stores its
configuration.


-- 
Fedora 17