Switching from net-tools to iproute2 or not? You probably have no choice, but the iproute2 cheat-sheet is 20+ pages…
Posted by jpluimers on 2018/03/20
Last year I came across this semi-humorous post: [WayBack] Bwahahaha, now that they took your init and replaced it with systemd, they are coming after your ifconfig. Next thing is that they will come after your… – Kristian Köhntopp – Google+
Underneath is a bigger problem: net-tools had been dormant for a long time, which means a lot of people rely on the predictable behaviour – especially by parsing the output for post processing.
Those days are definitely over: net-tools is in more active maintenance now breaking scripts like crazing. So since the foundation of networking on most distributions is now iproute2, it’s better to learn iproute2.
That’s not easy though, so here is some background reading to do:
- [WayBack] Moving on from net-tools [LWN.net]
- [WayBack] iproute2 cheat sheet – 20+ pages
- [WayBack] Introducing Linux Network Namespaces · Scott’s Weblog · The weblog of an IT pro specializing in virtualization, networking, open source, and cloud computing
- [Archive.is] networking:net-tools [Linux Foundation Wiki]
I got this little translation table from the last link:
program obsoleted by arp ip neigh ifconfig ip addr ipmaddr ip maddr iptunnel ip tunnel route ip route nameif ifrename mii-tool ethtool
–jeroen
The Wiert Corner - irregular stream of stuff 
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