ive asked this question at times and have gotten numerous completely different answers. im running redhat 9....

if i do not want to use dhcp, but instead want to manually set my ip address, default gateway, subnet mask, and dns servers, how do i do this? or should i say, what is the most direct way? is there one file that holds all of this info? and how do i specify whether or not i want to use dhcp in the first place?

On REDHAT (and AFAIK only RPM distros) the most DIRECT way is to edit the following file(s):

/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-<device>

# file contents...
DEVICE=<device>
BOOTPROTO=static
IPADDR=192.168.1.2
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE=Ethernet

<device> most likely = eth0 (the first ethernet device)

If you want DHCP then REMOVE the lines for IPADDR and NETMASK and make the BOOTPROTO line as so:

BOOTPROTO=DHCP

And yes, there are several Graphical and Wizard ways of doing the EXACT SAME THING, although (AFAIU [nderstand]) they all edit the file(s) at the location above.

ok. but that does nothing to set the default gateway or dns servers. what now?

DNS Servers - /etc/resolv.conf
Gateway - /etc/sysconfig/netwok

Same applies - this is RedHat (and RPM based dist) specific. Different dists put this in different areas.

ok my /etc/resolv.conf does indeed have my domain name and 2 dns servers. but /etc/sysconfig/network only has this:

NETWORKING=yes
HOSTNAME=myhostname.mydomainname.com

so im still not seeing where the gateway is coming from

My /etc/sysconfig/network file has your two lines, plus GATEWAY= like so:

NETWORKING=yes
HOSTNAME=me.inside
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1

well thats very odd because i dont have a gateway listed anywhere yet the network is working fine. this is exactly what i mean. this is also why people have so many frustrating problems with linux. theres never a clear answer to anything. but thank you for your help

(double checking RedHat 9 machine while typing on RedHat ES3 machine)...

Yes and no... if you are currently using DHCP - gateway is handled automatically - I can't find any other place where GATEWAY would make sense on my RH 9 system though - but overwhelmingly - it's not set anywhere (but it shouldn't be). My RH9 one does use DHCP - my ES3 does not.

I'm sticking by my previous answer.