From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Ben Greear Subject: Re: IP address: property of host or interface? Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2009 10:06:58 -0800 Message-ID: <497DFBC2.4030903@candelatech.com> References: <497B1E5E.9050309@msgid.tls.msk.ru> <497DF629.70602@hp.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Michael Tokarev , netdev To: Rick Jones Return-path: Received: from mail.candelatech.com ([208.74.158.172]:50830 "EHLO ns3.lanforge.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751621AbZAZSHT (ORCPT ); Mon, 26 Jan 2009 13:07:19 -0500 In-Reply-To: <497DF629.70602@hp.com> Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: Rick Jones wrote: >> So.. am I right that an IP address is a HOST property, not an INTERFACE >> property, and that the traditional way is just more convenient to set >> up? And >> that all the tools that complains that "there's no IP address >> assigned to this >> interface" (tcpdump) are wrong? :) > > There are two "schools" of thought - the Linux stack follows the "weak > end system" model in which IP addresses are treated as a host > property. There is another school of thought called the "strong end > system" model where IP addresses are an interface property. There are > some "other" stacks out there which can be configured to behave in a > "strong end system" way but they tend to default to more of something > in between the two. > > Tcpdump may simply be caught in the middle :) With a bit of configuring (away from system defaults), Linux can behave as a 'strong end system', and even in default behaviour, I don't believe it will process IP packets from an interface that has NO IP address assigned to it. Thanks, Ben > > rick jones > -- > To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe netdev" in > the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org > More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html -- Ben Greear Candela Technologies Inc http://www.candelatech.com