From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jul 17 11:55:21 2013 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 900E9343; Wed, 17 Jul 2013 11:55:21 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from feld@freebsd.org) Received: from out1-smtp.messagingengine.com (out1-smtp.messagingengine.com [66.111.4.25]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 657EBB4D; Wed, 17 Jul 2013 11:55:21 +0000 (UTC) Received: from compute2.internal (compute2.nyi.mail.srv.osa [10.202.2.42]) by gateway1.nyi.mail.srv.osa (Postfix) with ESMTP id C2C4D218E5; Wed, 17 Jul 2013 07:55:20 -0400 (EDT) Received: from web3 ([10.202.2.213]) by compute2.internal (MEProxy); Wed, 17 Jul 2013 07:55:20 -0400 DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha1; c=relaxed/relaxed; d= messagingengine.com; h=message-id:from:to:cc:mime-version :content-transfer-encoding:content-type:subject:date:in-reply-to :references; s=smtpout; bh=gYLEasA0ladY2ALXrpTZcBHKchc=; b=JCn+q VOE3epLWDOrmBF+LEs92e6H1ppKYLawxUF9wkqi04rjAp2bFNbZbnHIgV7sftO8O nd4khgOHLFZQy92oszJqbUpV+qsa2XlyqKnREyLRXhjDJ6VfsQUeyxFwTW6mV0tS uMRReeRxvKX70l3Pd+4N1HYNRjAF8rr89SRFCU= Received: by web3.nyi.mail.srv.osa (Postfix, from userid 99) id 8EF54B00003; Wed, 17 Jul 2013 07:55:20 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <1374062120.4532.140661256673649.36ED5B44@webmail.messagingengine.com> X-Sasl-Enc: JB1mJyAVB42XOS2LqpWjwaWFdPdlHFiV3gfN3ZDiPnk3 1374062120 From: Mark Felder To: Hiroki Sato , dewayne.geraghty@heuristicsystems.com.au, lukasz@wasikowski.net MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain X-Mailer: MessagingEngine.com Webmail Interface - ajax-5a449c7a Subject: Re: ipv6_addrs_IF aliases in rc.conf(5) Date: Wed, 17 Jul 2013 06:55:20 -0500 In-Reply-To: <20130717.183628.1254490649724740016.hrs@allbsd.org> References: <4c07217dc9200841dfd065a6d52849eb@mx1.enfer-du-nord.net> <20130712.160358.1330135778606339435.hrs@allbsd.org> <14677223DB6D4CD48E880520725B3552@white> <20130717.183628.1254490649724740016.hrs@allbsd.org> Cc: rkoberman@gmail.com, freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.org X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 17 Jul 2013 11:55:21 -0000 On Wed, Jul 17, 2013, at 4:36, Hiroki Sato wrote: > > The recommended way is ifconfig_IF_aliasN or ifconfig_IF_aliases. > ipv4_addr_IF will not be removed in the near future, but please use > ifconfig_IF_alias{N,es} for newly-configured systems. Backward > compatibility for not breaking the existing configurations will be > maintained as much as possible (even on the upcoming 10.0R and > later). > Almost everyone is familiar with ifconfig_IF_aliasN, but can you provide example syntax for ifconfig_IF_aliases ? I've never seen that before and can't find it documented. > > This is because we have a lot of variables which have (almost) the > same functionality in rc.conf and I want to simplify them by merging > them with each other, not because these are better than the others. > Variables with overlapped functionality have made difficult to > maintain/improve the rc.d scripts. > I would actually prefer to see the ifconfig_IF_aliasN syntax go away entirely as it simply cannot scale without becoming tedious. I know we can't cover every edge case, but after discussing with people on this list about the desire for ipv6_addrs_IF, now committed, it seems I'm not the only example of this use case. The best scenario I can describe is a situation where you have a shared webhosting environment on FreeBSD. I may very well have 200 IPs on one server. Being able to use ranges and CIDR syntax is invaluable. The idea of ifconfig_IF_aliasN is not so bad as long as you never have to make any changes. However, it's not uncommon to receive a work order from sales where a customer needs to be moved from the shared webhosting environment to their own private VM. We need to move the IP they were using as we probably do not control DNS and it might be difficult for the customer to get that changed. Removing an IP from the middle of 200 ifconfig_IF_aliasN entries requires you to renumber them all. This is simply cruel and error-prone. Being able to adjust the ranges of ipv4_addrs_IF is much cleaner and reliable. This thread isn't exactly the proper forum to debate the future of network configuration on FreeBSD, but please take this into consideration. And thank you for your work on the rc.d scripts -- they're the #1 reason many of us prefer working with FreeBSD.