Linux – Network naming on Arch Linux

arch linuxinterfacenetworkingsystemdudev

I've just installed Arch Linux on my old PC, to do the installation I used wifi-menu wlan0, now I've reboot but if I type:

ifconfig wlan0 up

I have as a result:

wlan0: ERROR while getting interface flag: no such device

I read that after the installation Arch changes the name of wlan, how can I find the new name and how could I change it?

Best Answer

From systemd v197 predictable network names were introduced.

With systemd 197 we have added native support for a number of different naming policies into systemd/udevd proper and made a scheme similar to biosdevname's (but generally more powerful, and closer to kernel-internal device identification schemes) the default.1

You can use ip link to show all of your devices.

You then have the choice of renaming any or all of those devices or continuing to use the ones that systemd/udev provide.

Should you wish to rename it/them to something that you feel more comfortable with, you can place a udev rule in /etc/udev/rules.d/ called 10-net-naming.rules, for example:

SUBSYSTEM=="net", ACTION=="add", ATTR{address}=="20:a7:d3:68:50:g8", NAME="ether"
SUBSYSTEM=="net", ACTION=="add", ATTR{address}=="a8:c7:43:1d:f4:53", NAME="wifi"

would rename wireless and ethernet to, imaginatively, wifi and ether. You then need to update your network manager to use the new names.

There is a very detailed post on the Arch Mailing Lists announcing the change.

1.http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/PredictableNetworkInterfaceNames

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