[luau] Road Runner

[Jimen Ching]

Mark, Ray, Warren,

Ok, I have reviewed all of the new information, and here is my analysis of
the situation.

1.  The kernel is compiled with networking support and recognizes the
Intel PRO/1000 Ethernet card.  Warren, I doubt a new kernel is needed.
You mentioned there was a problem with the EEPro100.  This is an
EtherExpress card.  I do not believe the problem you remember applies
here, unless an Intel PRO/1000 is the same as an EtherExpress Pro100,
which I doubt.  But I am not against upgrading to the latest kernel.  I
just do not believe it is necessary in this case.  Mark, I do recommend
you install a kernel version that Oracle has tested with.

2.  DHCP is installed.  It must be, since running it resulted in an error
message about it being running already.  More about this later.

3.  All of the other information provided seems to indicate that the
problem points to the DHCP/networking configuration.

As I see it, there are potentially two problems.  First, DHCP does not
seem to be running after bootup.  If you installed and correctly
configured it, the system should have started it up at boot time.  If you
were not able to find it with 'ps aux', it means the program ran into
problems at startup, or something killed it after bootup.

Second, as Patrick suggested, there might be a hardware problem.  But I
doubt it is the cable.  This is assuming you moved the cable from your
Windows box to your Linux box, instead of using a different cable for the
Linux box.  If you are using a different cable, I suggest verifying the
Linux cable is working by using it with your Windows box.  If Windows
start to fail when using the other cable, then you know the cable is bad.
If the hardware problem is with the Ethernet card itself.  I can only
suggest swapping it with the Windows box, just as a test.

Assuming the problem is _not_ with hardware, we still need to figure out
why DHCP is not running, or was killed.  Unfortunately, I am not a RedHat
user, so I have no idea how RedHat implemented their network
configuration.  So if Warren and Ray could help me out, I have a few
questions.

In Debian, there is a directory called /etc/network.  In this directory,
there is a file called 'interfaces'.  The contents of this file for me is:

--------------------------------------------------------
iface lo inet loopback

# The first network card - this entry was created during the Debian installation
iface eth0 inet dhcp
        up /etc/dhcpc.sh

iface eth1 inet static
        address 192.168.1.1
        network 192.168.1.0
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 192.168.1.255
--------------------------------------------------------

I have a local area network, so ignore eth1 for now.  Eth0 is my Linux box
connected to RR.  Notice Debian created an entry that uses DHCP and a
special shell script.  I am using this system as a masquarading host, so
that is why the script is needed.  I also use DynDNS, so the script
registers the IP address with this system.

Anyway, this is how Debian configures the network.  How does RedHat
configure the interface for DHCP?  Ray, I think it is better to determine
why RedHat is not running DHCP automatically, rather than running
/sbin/dhcpcd.  Since we are talking about RR, there is no reason to
manually startup the network.

I have other, additonal comments.

1.  Mark, you need to login as root from your KDE environment to run all
of the commands that everyone is asking you to run.  The reason you got
an error when you typed 'ifconfig' was because you were not root.  Ray,
Warren, correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't RedHat include /sbin in the
path when you are logged in as root?

To login as root, just open up a terminal.  There must be an icon
somewhere or in a menu that looks like a monitor.  That is a 'terminal'
icon.  It opens up a window and run a shell in it.  Next, you need to run
'su' from the shell prompt.  'su' stands for _superuser_, which is the
'root' account.  Now, you can run all programs without typing
/sbin/progname.  There is no need to use Ctrl-Alt-F7.  The only reason I
use this key combination is to reboot the computer from the console.
There is no other purpose for the console to exist when you are using KDE.

Another benefit of using a terminal application instead of Ctrl-Alt-F7 is
that you can copy and paste the output of those programs into an editor.
The terminal app usually has a scroll bar, so if the output scrolls off
the window, just move the scroll bar up and copy the text.

2.  The dmesg output suggests that the kernel already recognized the
Ethernet card.  This means the device driver was compiled into the kernel.
So there is no need to worry about loadable modules.  If no one knows what
this is, it doesn't matter.  It is not important.

3.  Concerning the contents of the /etc/resolv.conf file.  I think having
only one IP address listed is a mistake.  I had problems where the first
DNS server on the list was down.  If there was no backup, I would have
been locked out of the Internet.  The fact that there is only one entry
could mean something went wrong.  If one entry is correct, I think RR
mis-configured their system.  Someone should phone them up and complain.

4.  Concerning re-installing DHCP, I only suggested this as a quick fix.
We could try to figure out what went wrong with DHCP.  But it would be a
lot easier to just uninstall the program, then install it again and go
through the configuration procedure.  This will clear out all of the bad
configuration files and start out fresh.  Since the current configuration
doesn't work anyway, there is no point in keeping those configuration
files.  As for how to 're-install' DHCP, I guess if there is no graphical
package management application, you will need to use RedHat's rpm program.
Again, I don't use RedHat, so Warren and Ray would have to correct me if I
am wrong.  But type the following after placing RedHat's CD into the CD
drive:

rpm --uninstall dhcpcd
rpm --install dhcpcd

(don't forget, you need to do this after you started up the terminal
application and 'su' into root)

I hope rpm is smart enough to look for a cdrom.  If not, Warren or Ray
would have to chyme in and provide the correct procedure.  Matter of fact,
it is best to wait until Warren or Ray respond and answer my question
about how RedHat configures the network.

--jc
--
Jimen Ching (WH6BRR)      jching at flex.com     wh6brr at uhm.ampr.org