Bug 19458

Summary:	annoying wait on eth0 when using pcmcia wireless... init script problem
Product:	Gentoo Linux	Reporter:	Spundun Bhatt <spundun>
Component:	[OLD] Core system	Assignee:	Mobile Herd (OBSOLETE) <mobile+disabled>
Status:	RESOLVED WONTFIX
Severity:	normal	CC:	chadh, pvdabeel
Priority:	High
Version:	1.4_rc2
Hardware:	All
OS:	Linux
Whiteboard:
Package list:		Runtime testing required:	---
Bug Depends on:
Bug Blocks:	68964

Description Spundun Bhatt 2003-04-17 01:22:11 UTC

Hi this might be a duplicate of 1990... I am not sure.
I am using built in ethernet controller and wlan-ng prism2.5 pcmcia card.
Th problem is when I use pcmcia card. At boot time the init script still tried
to start net.eth0 (ofcourse it doesnt know that I have not plugged the eth cable
but have inserted the pcmcia card). It waits for annoying amount of time before
failing.
Then it fials on the following dependent services also .. lke netmount and cupsd.
Then when as root I type /etc/init.d/pcmcia restart.... my wireless goes up.

I request a change in the init scripts so that it tries to detect both services
parallelly.. and on getting one service up it will continue forward to boot
properly and also remove the annoying wait.
The second interface can keep waiting till its timeout expires.
Thanx
Spundun

Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
1.Unplug thernet cable
2.Insert wlan pcmcia device
3.Reboot the machine

Actual Results:  
Machine fails to start eth0 and doesnot start wlan0 properly
later as root on /etc/ini.d/pcmcia restart.... wlan0 starts properly automatically

Expected Results:  
on boot  wlan0 interface should start automaticaly and os should not wait on the
eth0 startup timeout

Comment 1 Chad Huneycutt (RETIRED) gentoo-dev

2003-04-17 18:13:43 UTC

This is part of a larger problem in Gentoo right now (and other distributions).  Integrating multiple profiles with the OS is tricky business, and pcmcia-cs doesn't make it very easy.  There are a couple things you can do for now.  The first is to grab /usr/portage/sys-apps/pcmcis-cs/files/network.orig and replace /etc/pcmcia/network with it.  Then you can use regular pcmcia-cs schemes (see the pcmcia-cs howto).

Another option is to use quickswitch.  I use this personally, and it works pretty well.  You can configure it to use a kernel parameter to determine which connection to start at bootup.

Comment 2 Sankara Krishnamoorthy 2003-04-28 07:24:24 UTC

when I'm away, I usually have the iface_eth0 commented out in /etc/conf.d/net. I believe since Redhat 8, startup doesn't wait for more than 2 secs giving an error "Timed out, check link"...

Comment 3 Henrik Brix Andersen 2004-10-21 09:33:05 UTC

You can lower the dhcpcd timeout by setting dhcpcd_eth0="-t 10"

Comment 4 Henrik Brix Andersen 2005-04-25 04:26:26 UTC

The best solution is to add a check for link in the preup() function of /etc/conf.d/net.

Example:

ebegin "Checking link on ${IFACE}"
mii-tool ${IFACE} 2> /dev/null | grep -q 'link ok'
eend $?