Hello all,
I'm looking for a program that does automatic network configuration based on the mac address of a specific ip on the lan using arp packets. Currently I use guessnet & ifplugd on debian and it works ok, however I don't use debian on all my laptops so I need something distro-independent. I use my laptops in 4 different networks & this is quite handy...

.:: zen ::.

Can't you get those two packages as source, edit their makefiles and put them on any distro?

I kind of settled with RH for the moment. If the other distros you use are strictly POSIX--I am unfamiliar with ArchLinux or Devil-linux--the .deb should work with them. .deb used to work on SuSE as well, but I haven't run it in a while, so it might have changed.

(RH has instructions for editing makefiles to the targets on their distro as do others, but I can't remember where to find the instructions--you'll have to search around or ask someone who is more knowledgable. But, if you find something that works for you, use it everywhere--you don't have to wait for the rpm. You can make one--read Maximum RPM for RH. Also, there is the Alien command as well. Actually, packages usually build okay in redhat without any changes, only a few have ever needed tweaking if you use the native kernel source and compiler for the distribution. I am pretty sure that goes for any distribution.)

BTW: You are so much more cutting edge than I am. I didn't even know they were even out yet. I haven't been keeping up.

My problem has nothing to do with the packaging scheme (aka .deb), I can compile them from source.
The problem is that guessnet uses debian's ifupdown to setup network, which btw. uses ip not ifconfig & that's where things get confused.
I want a program that parses a config file, checks mac addresses of specific hosts (listed on that file) using arp & finally setup network using ifconfig & route (for the gateway).

ps. Currently I use quickswitch for manual configuration, but the automatic approach is the best .

That would be the edits I was talking about in the make files for the respective packages. Should I choose, I can do anything I wish to any distribution, it is just an investment of time.

The packages you want to install would be called by init scripts after initializing eth0, sort of a non-specific logon to a network, with a request to the host for identification of the network and a request for assignment of an address, then pointing to a configuration file to complete a dynamic set up of all the services, based upon the returned domain identification.
Pretty neat, especially if it is set up to do it with just a restart of the involved services and not on boot. If that is the case, it would be firing up a service(or a lot of entries in the xinetd configuration file) which can bring up and down all of the networking related services and re-configure them--which would be convenient for the wireless stuff. I am really a cave-man. If I can find the time, I would love to read the source for that application.

RedHat has non-POSIX directories and files for their init-scripts and network configuration. However, they use mostly all of the same scripts and the syntax of the scripts is unchanged. They changed the targets, not the functionality of the different applications. Otherwise, it would have been a complete re-write of send-mail, tcp/ip, the whole she-bang. Way too much time to re-invent the wheel. (Especially since everything worked the other way.) Breaking things up as they did actually followed the spirit of linux, because some of the configuration files were getting large and unwieldy, and it was getting more and more complicated to insert changes and settings. Frankly the scripts were getting to be a bear (you have to get them just right or you break things).

Different people went about the same purpose in different ways. Because the order of everything is quite important. You can't mount or link to anything which itself is not mounted, nor can you start any service or daemon which is dependent on anything else which is not started (or hasn't been configured yet by parsing the config. files). In a very few cases, there are re-writes of services--I hate that--which involve the actual manipulation of source before compilation--I really hate that--so things work. [The last time I played with Debian, I could compile a "vanilla" kernal from downloaded source and it would work. If that is still true, the configuration scripts are probably the same, the target directories and names of the individual scripts may be different in the make-files. That is how I learned to do the editing for other distributions (like RH), I read everything.]

/*Not too terribly long ago, changes to the kernal made things much more efficient-- they started to load everything from boot-up as multi-threaded fully functional parallel operations. This speeds things up a lot, but it means that everything has to be right-on-the-money to work. I'm scared of changing stuff for that reason. I need to invest time in reading the files, scripts, and source changes to learn how to manipulate things the way I used to. It seems that I'm a newbie all over again--I hate that.*/

Again, it is a matter of the investment of time.

I really haven't had the time to spend on setting up lap-tops--in "the old days" laptops were truly a bear to set up, so admittedly, I avoided it. I am a crappy programmer, and never have considered myself as ready-for-prime-time as an administrator, but given time and determination I can do just about anything with Linux.

(Since I am also slow, usually someone else gets it done before I do. I have a few drivers and other source patches which were better than half-done when somebody else released patches which only needed a few tweaks to work really well. I hesitate to trust my stuff more than anyone else's--especially when they are long-time contributors.)

The point is, the vast majority of cases where you have the source available and the distribution of linux is well maintained, there is usually instructions somewhere in the documentation on what changes are needed to customize any package to any distribution (if you are compiling from source). For the major distributions, the details are usually with-in the package documentation itself. With a few of the other distributions, the information is in the documentation for the distribution--if you can't find it, go to a user group specific to the package/distribution and put it to them. Most likely, if it isn't something easily found in their documentation or in their FAQs you will get a sheepish response in less than 24 hours. [ There was something I wanted for RedHat which didn't come with the distribution--and the package docs stated that it hadn't been tested or set up with RH--the package creator gave me the information to attempt it. By the time I got it working someone else had created an RPM. I told you I was slow. In the time I've spent typing this huge, useless entry, someone may have already done a port of the programs you want to all of the other distributions. It can happen that fast.]

No respose==you didn't look.

I have found, personally, if I ask where I can look up the information--if it isn't in a really obvious place--I get the fastest response. [Sometimes, in a matter of minutes (if others are online). I've gotten away with cross-posting for that--as long as I mentioned that I have it cross-posted because I have legitimate time-constraints.]

Don't feel bad about it, just start looking. Don't cross-post all over the place as you will stop getting any response from anybody. (You don't want to get labelled as being too lazy to read the Docs. It takes abject apology, and proof that you've read everything to return from ex-communication--been there, done that. You don't want to go there. Really.)

People who have concentrated on lap-tops are the most knowledgable and most creative of the linux power-users. They are justified in their pride in what they have been able to accomplish. (Many, if not most of them, are Debian users. There are high expectations for anyone who uses Debian--but my understanding is that they have become more understanding of those of us who don't have a lot of time invested--yet-- in all of their documentation. Perhaps I'll go to that distribution next. [I tried and gave up on Debian a little more than a year ago, but I am more patient and knowledgable now.])

As I said before, I wasn't even aware that they had even released the auto-network application, let alone a stable and completely functional version. I have fallen woefully behind. Linux is dynamic and the changes have been dramatic in the last few months/years.

Since RedHat is going to drop the support for the non-enterprise users I am going to have to go to another distro for non-server use. With all of the changes that have been made in the last year and a half since I used other distros, it is going to be like starting from scratch. Bummer. (I wasn't even aware that a control panel (GUI) tool has been added for changing settings for grub and lilo on KDE and Gnome. I feel like a cave-man.)

Nice and long reply, I'm not sure I got your point though. I think my post was quite specific & I don't intent to cross-post et al. Don't be misunderstood, I, by no means, don't want to insult you with this reply .

Anyway, I guess I'll create my own bash scripts to do the job, when I have some spare time.

btw. If you're looking for a new distro, check arch linux (www.archlinux.org) .

The point I was making: chances are the Debian ifupdown scripts are not all that difficult to figure out. Unless, they rewrote all of the services and tcp/ip, the syntax of the files or files moved to directories, is going to be the same across the different distributions. (That is why a package can be adapted to RH.)

To make the utility non-distro specific may be as simple as editing the make file for the package source to point to the actual configuration files whose contents are the same as on Debian (albeit in a different place). The file with the different network settings may be part of the package; created when the package is installed, and manipulated with a tool located in that package or another which you would have to find.

Most of the time, the actual configuration for a service or application is not changed, it is merely moved. To change it involves re-writing the whole thing--involving tens of thousands of lines of source code. I can't say that it isn't done. I can say that it is rare.

It is most probable that the source packages which make up guessnet have documentation within them which will instruct you how to edit the make files in order for them to install to other distributions.

If not, there will be documentation which specifies the differences in placement of files and controls for each distribution on their respective websites.

Worse come to worst, I know for a FACT*, that Debian is strictly POSIX. Which means that I can research how the other distributions differ from that, and make adjustments to the makefiles using that information.

There is no necessity for re-inventing the wheel. It is a matter of ensuring all of the dependencies for the package are met.

*As of December of 2002 anyway--hey, it might have changed since then. There are always debates about exactly what is POSIX.