Starting a second loopback interface and services at startup

[Robert Lowe]

Robert Lowe wrote:

> Hi!
> 
> New to FreeBSD and running 5.2.1-RELEASE on an Alpha.  I do predominantly
> SysV/ATT boxes, so I feel a bit out of it...
> 
> Question #1:
> I need to create a second loopback interface, which I can do just fine
> at the command line:
> 
> # ifconfig lo1 create
> # ifconfig lo1 inet a.b.c.d netmask x.x.x.x
> 
> How do I automate this at startup?  I stumbled across something in
> /etc/network.subr that suggests I ought to create /etc/start_if.lo1
> which would then be sourced.  I assume I can add a ifconfig_lo1
> variable to /etc/rc.conf.  I tried these, but with no luck.  Can
> anyone point the way?

I figured out the correct way to do this:

1. Override the default network_interfaces variable in
    /etc/defaults/rc.conf in /etc/rc.conf.  This is a space-separated
    list of interfaces to start.  I included the new loopback interface
    to create.
2. Create a /etc/start_if.<if-name> script to create the interface.
3. Add a ifconfig_<if> variable to rc.conf as well.  I had this already,
    so I did not have to do anything.

The reason the last two steps did nothing before was the list of
interfaces in the netif script is generated using 'ifconfig -l',
which of course does not include interfaces which haven't yet been
created, and so the start_if.<if-name> script is not run.

> Question #2:
> I'm trying to start Quagga services on this box (zebra and ospfd).
> I added scripts to /usr/local/etc/rc.d/ for these two, but no luck.
> They work fine from the command line, e.g.
> 
> # /usr/local/etc/rc.d/zebra.sh start
> # /usr/local/etc/rc.d/ospfd.sh start
> 
> Both have the .sh extension, which seems to be required.  How should
> I troubleshoot this?  I don't find anything in dmesg.today suggesting
> that there was even an attempt to run the scripts.  Also, can one use
> the rcorder keywords to provide startup ordering for scripts in
> /usr/local/etc/rc.d ???

The scripts now run properly, but in the wrong order, so I still need
an answer here.  They seem to execute in alpha-numeric order.  I suppose
I could start them in one script, but that's not really the answer.  Help!
I suppose I could use the Snn<name> SysV approach.  ;-)

-Robert