Disabling NetworkManager

[Alex]

Hi,

How do I properly disable NetworkManager so applications don't think
my wired network is offline? I'm using a network bridge for kvm, and
it's always been easier to use the old style networking. I've run the
following commands to disable it and enable regular network services:

  systemctl stop NetworkManager.service
  systemctl disable NetworkManager.service
  systemctl enable network.service
  systemctl start network.service

My network is then functional, but Evolution and sometimes Firefox
complain the network is stopped yet still enabled. If I disable it
with systemctl entirely, Xorg crashes with the following:

Nov 28 15:14:08 sage dbus[772]: [system] Activation via systemd failed
for unit 'dbus-org.freedesktop.NetworkManager.service':
 Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.NetworkManager.service failed to load: No
such file or directory. See system logs and 'systemctl st
atus dbus-org.freedesktop.NetworkManager.service' for details.

It then produces hundreds of directories with crash info in /var/spool/abrt/.

Any ideas of how to properly disable NetworkManager so applications
don't stop working?

Thanks,
Alex