[OpenIndiana-discuss] nwam (was: IPv6 DHCP)

Tue Feb 28 15:40:14 UTC 2012

NWAM tries to "do the right thing" for laptops - especially in the face of
wifi configuration which without it is a multi-stage process on the command
line. This sort of stuff was seen as a barrier to entry for opensolaris,
esp given the comparable solutions in the windows and mac worlds.

But sometimes it does the wrong thing and sometimes it gets in the way -
you might not want it to choose 100baseT over wifi, it tends to break
VirtualBox by happily unplumbing its interfaces.

The consequence is you either love it because like me you don't want to
remember a whole sequence of commands, you just want to read your mail) or
you hate it because you are an ageing Sun field engineer who wants minute
control over your environment (you know who you are).

The docs do a pretty good summation:
http://arc.opensolaris.org/caselog/PSARC/2008/532/20080819_renee.danson

http://hub.opensolaris.org/bin/view/Project+nwam/

Most people whose opinions I trust would not let it anywhere near a
server.  You need to know whats going on under the covers there and that it
will not change behind your back and NWAM is completely orthogonal to zones
and clusters and vlans and so forth. Great for idlers like me tho ;-)
/d

On 28 February 2012 00:49, Robbie Crash <sardonic.smiles at gmail.com> wrote:

> I was figuring out nwam last night, and it looks as though you can push
> network profiles based on user. But I could be totally off on that, I
> didn't investigate further than the mention of it.
>
> Something like that, I can see being very useful on a server assuming non
> admins are logging into it for any reason.
>
> Also it allows auto pushing modules based on STREAM or something that I
> glanced at that seems to do the same kind of thing, but again I'm not sure
> since I just glanced at it.
>
> Or is that A) not what those things actually do. Or B) not what they should
> be used for?
> On Feb 27, 2012 7:24 PM, "Richard L. Hamilton" <rlhamil at smart.net> wrote:
>
> > You have (service names from an earlier release, may not be identical):
> > EITHER
> > svc:/network/physical:nwam
> > OR
> > svc:/network/physical:default
> >
> > Only one of those can be used.  The first tries to Do The Right Thing,
> > automagically (including DHCP and all that); the second is for a
> > straightforward static configuration.
> >
> > Nwam probably makes sense for something mobile, like a laptop.  It _may_
> > make sense for fixed workstations if the infrastructure is there to use
> it,
> > so that workstation deployment can be simplified.  It probably does _not_
> > make sense for a server, most of the time.
> >
> > You can't really mix and match features between the two.  Well, you
> > probably could, by creating a third alternative using some of what the
> > others use as tools.  But that's neither supported nor easy.
> >
> > On Feb 27, 2012, at 6:32 PM, Robbie Crash wrote:
> >
> > > Is configuring these things through nwam not the /proper/ way to do
> > things?
> > > I don't understand why all the help pages say to disable nwam for
> static
> > IP
> > > configuration.
> > >
> > > On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 15:58, James Carlson <carlsonj at workingcode.com
> > >wrote:
> > >
> > >> russell wrote:
> > >>> Hi,
> > >>>
> > >>> I have configured my OI_151 installation with a static IPv4 address
> and
> > >>> would like to configure IPv6 to work with DHCP but the notes I've
> found
> > >>> appear to require nwam to be running but I have disabled this.
> > >>
> > >> Might be helpful to provide a link or a copy of those notes.  They
> don't
> > >> sound accurate.
> > >>
> > >>> I would appreciate a suggestion on how to configure OI manually to
> only
> > >>> use DHCP for IPv6. I would like to have the IPv6 use both SLAAC and a
> > >>> DHCPv6 server.
> > >>
> > >> The standards-compliant way to do this is to plumb up one or more IPv6
> > >> interfaces and make sure that svc:/network/routing/ndp:default is
> > enabled.
> > >>
> > >> When you do that, in.ndpd(1M), the IPv6 autoconfiguration daemon, will
> > >> run.  That daemon will listen to ICMPv6 Router Advertisement messages.
> > >> If the messages say that a given prefix uses DHCPv6, then it will
> > >> automatically start dhcpagent(1M), and that will configure the
> address.
> > >> (Unlike DHCPv4, the prefix length -- aka "subnet" -- comes from the
> RA,
> > >> not from the DHCP server.  Only the address itself comes from DHCP.
> > >> It's how DHCPv4 should have been done ...)
> > >>
> > >> If you have one or more IPv6 routers, and they all say that you
> > >> shouldn't run DHCPv6 on a prefix, then it will not be run.  If you
> have
> > >> no IPv6 routers (a bit of a degenerate case in the standards), then
> > >> DHCPv6 is required to run, and the system will run it, but it's almost
> > >> completely useless.
> > >>
> > >> See in.ndpd(1M), dhcpagent(1M), and ifconfig(1M) for details.
> > >>
> > >> --
> > >> James Carlson         42.703N 71.076W         <
> carlsonj at workingcode.com
> > >
> > >>
> > >> _______________________________________________
> > >> OpenIndiana-discuss mailing list
> > >> OpenIndiana-discuss at openindiana.org
> > >> http://openindiana.org/mailman/listinfo/openindiana-discuss
> > >>
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > Seconds to the drop, but it seems like hours.
> > >
> > > http://www.eff.org/
> > > <http://www.eff.org/>http://creativecommons.org/
> > > _______________________________________________
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> > > OpenIndiana-discuss at openindiana.org
> > > http://openindiana.org/mailman/listinfo/openindiana-discuss
> > >
> >
> > --
> > The waitress asked, "Do you want lemon or no lemon with that iced tea?"
> > Naturally, I said "yes", and then burst out laughing, because there
> simply
> > wasn't any other answer in Boolean logic.  She didn't get it, but I got
> > the lemon, which I wanted anyway.  Later, I realized a quantum computer
> > could have offered another answer: Schroedinger's Lemon!
> >
> >
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> >
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-- 
Dominic Kay
+44 780 124 6099