[OpenIndiana-discuss] OI Hipster becomes unreachable over network after a certain length of uptime

[Joshua M. Clulow]

On Tue, 12 Apr 2022 at 11:52, Udo Grabowski (IMK) <udo.grabowski at kit.edu> wrote:
> On 12/04/2022 20:42, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:
> > On Tue, 12 Apr 2022, Judah Richardson wrote:
> >> On Tue, Apr 12, 2022, 13:27 Udo Grabowski (IMK) <udo.grabowski at kit.edu>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >>> On 12/04/2022 20:00, John D Groenveld wrote:
> >>>> In message <e042f009-5caa-bae0-5181-d294d4ad213b at kit.edu>, "Udo
> >>> Grabowski (IMK)
> >>>> " writes:
> >>>>> No, it isn't, it's controlled by
> >>>>> /lib/svc/manifest/network/routing/route.xml ,
> >>>>> which is not enabled by default, as practically no machine
> >>>>> in the field is working as a router, you have to specifically
> >>>>> enable the route:default service.
> >>>>
> >>>> svc:/network/routing/route is enabled out of the box with
> >>>> OI-hipster-text-20211031.iso
> >>>
> >>> Why ?? This hasn't been the case for at least two decades of
> >>> Solaris and beyond.
> >>
> >> Probably an oversight, I'd guess. As with many such situations, things
> >> that
> >> aren't obviously and critically broken don't get much attention ;)
> >
> > It is not really an oversight since all computers with a TCP/IP stack
> > need to deal with some level of routing even if they are not acting as a
> > gateway.  If there is ever more than one way to get "there" via the L2
> > network then running a higher-level routing protocol (e.g. RIP) can help
> > the TCP/IP stack make the right decisions if the involved routers use
> > the same protocol.  The host might participate in RIP or it might just
> > act as an observer.
> >
> > In many cases one or more computers are attached to a shared L2 network
> > with a single upstream router. In this case, using DHCP to configure the
> > default route, or static configuration to provide the default route, can
> > be a good choice. There are other means such as ICMP Router Discovery
> > Protocol (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICMP_Router_Discovery_Protocol)
> > or even ICMP redirects.
>
> I have a few machines with two L2 networks (a.k.a. tagged VPN), and even
> those don't require the routing service. In fact, in my over 3 decades
> of experience with Sun machines, I only once have seen that the routing
> service had to be active. That one case was when I experimented with the
> COMSTAR network simulation tools to play with virtual switches and
> routers.

Goodness, what a lot of mails!

This is indeed a bug:

    14006 ipv4-routing should not be enabled by default
        https://www.illumos.org/issues/14006

I haven't had time to work on it, but I am happy to talk it through
with people who would like to pick it up and get it fixed!


Cheers.

-- 
Joshua M. Clulow
http://blog.sysmgr.org