Hello, Second time poster.. Long time reader.

I had a question regarding how the device name eth0 originates and how I can change the kernel numbering to start at 1. Its an unfortunate circumstace that the silk screens on the dell pc I bought labels the ports eth1 and eth2, so rather than change the silk screens if its of more minimal impact, I'd like to change the kernel numbering for the devices.

I figure there is a place in the source where it maintains a number of eth devices registered and appends something of the "eth"+devnum to get the next available number.

I have been reading a lot about having grub set the configuration parameters for ethernet via the linux line. but eth0 seems to be required.

Anyone have some insight into this pesky little problem?

rbecker,
you can change the entries in the file /etc/modules.conf. The entries are set during installation by the kernel. In this file, you find the module and the appropriate ethernet device.
Hope this helps,
cheers bagira

Thanks for the reply. Doesnt the modules.cofng ste up an alias indicating which module to load when a particular device is specified? Or is there an alternate function I am not aware of.

I have it set up now where it allocates the devices starting at 1, but I havent gotten it completely right. ifconfig -a shows eth1 and eth2, but ifup doesnt understand eth1 it only understands eth0.

I changed the dev_alloc_name() routine to start allocating names at 1 instead of 0.