Bug 152582

Summary:	add support for defining interface name for ppp session
Product:	Gentoo Linux	Reporter:	Bjarke Istrup Pedersen (RETIRED) <gurligebis>
Component:	Current packages	Assignee:	Alin Năstac (RETIRED) <mrness>
Status:	RESOLVED CANTFIX
Severity:	normal
Priority:	High
Version:	unspecified
Hardware:	All
OS:	Other
Whiteboard:
Package list:		Runtime testing required:	---

Description Bjarke Istrup Pedersen (RETIRED) gentoo-dev

2006-10-23 12:00:06 UTC

I would be nice to be able to pass a parameter to pppd, to make it call it's interface something different than pppX (and still use pppX when it's not passed).
The reason I'm asking for this is, that I use PPPoE for my internet connection, and use PPP for my VPN connections.
The problem is, that I use ppp+ to catch all my vpn connection in my firewall script, and now, after I changed ISP and have to use PPPoE, it breaks, since it also catches ppp0, which isn't a VPN connection, but my PPPoE connection.

I have been talking with the baselayout guys, and they will implement the baselayout stuff, if pppd gets this feature.

I don't want to rename every ppp connection, just a single one, and let the rest still use pppX as thier name.

Comment 1 Alin Năstac (RETIRED) gentoo-dev

2006-10-23 12:17:31 UTC

Unfortunately this cannot be done. 
The PPP kernel support create network interfaces named as "ppp${unit}", where unit must uniquely identify the PPP link. User-space tools also expect PPP interfaces to be named accordingly (e.g. pppstats).

If someone will ever make Linux PPP interface names user-selectable, he/she will need to rewrite the entire kernel and user space PPP support from scratch.