From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Matt Domsch Date: Sun, 11 Oct 2009 23:04:02 +0000 Subject: Re: PATCH: Network Device Naming mechanism and policy Message-Id: <20091011230402.GA18776@mock.linuxdev.us.dell.com> List-Id: References: <20091009140000.GA18765@mock.linuxdev.us.dell.com> <20091009210909.GA9836@auslistsprd01.us.dell.com> <20091009194401.036da080@nehalam> <20091010044056.GA5350@mock.linuxdev.us.dell.com> <20091010052308.GA12458@kroah.com> <7e84ed60910111410g52ffd52bjec62576570d4b460@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <7e84ed60910111410g52ffd52bjec62576570d4b460@mail.gmail.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: Rob Townley Cc: Greg KH , Stephen Hemminger , netdev@vger.kernel.org, linux-hotplug@vger.kernel.org, Narendra_K@dell.com, jordan_hargrave@dell.com On Sun, Oct 11, 2009 at 04:10:03PM -0500, Rob Townley wrote: > So when an add-in PCI NIC has a lower MAC than the motherboard NICs, > the add-in cards will come before the motherboard NICs. i don't like it. Actually, MAC address has nothing to do with device naming/ordering at all. Often systems will have onboard NICs in ascending MAC address order, but that's not a requirement, and I've seen systems not do that. And once you get to add-in vs onboard, BIOS wouldn't be able to enforce such an ordering anyhow (in general). But yes, you raise the point that, without using MAC-assigned names or another naming mechanism designed to cope with this, adding or removing a card can cause a difference in device enumeration, and thus name. -- Matt Domsch Technology Strategist, Dell Office of the CTO linux.dell.com & www.dell.com/linux