Using any network interface whatsoever (solution?)

[Sergey Babkin]

>From: Mike Meyer 
>In <4438A0A3.3050600 at bitfreak.org>, Darren Pilgrim <darren.pilgrim at bitfreak.org> typed:

>> >> That's far better than trying to remember what's on em0.
>> > 
>> > That's certainly true. But is there an advantage to tieing the
>> > PublicLAN name to a MAC address as opposed to em0?
>> You could test two different drivers on the same hardware and you wouldn't 
>> have to duplicate or modify your ifconfig lines in /etc/rc.conf, just run:
>
>Yup, and this is an advantage. On the other hand, if you tie the
>device name to the slot number (the real goal), you can swap different
>hardware into that slot without having to modify any configuration
>information at all. If you tie the name to the MAC address, you always

Nope, there is more than one goal. Sometimes you want
to tie the device name to the slot, so that you can
change the cards seamlessly. Sometimes you want
to tie the device name to the card, so that you can
move the card around between the slots (this is
especially true for USB where you can change the
topology very easily). 

I think the better solution is to let the administrator
decide which particular way of tying the names he
wants to use for a particular card. (And maybe
make some reasonable guess by default, maybe
depending on the device type).

-SB