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    Ifconfig Vs Ip

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    emka
    This document compares the ifconfig and ip network configuration commands in Linux. Ifconfig has been used for a long time but is now deprecated, as the ip command from the iproute2 utility package provides more powerful functionality. The ip command can replace all commands from the net-tools package, including ifconfig, and performs network configuration using netlink sockets rather than ioctl for improved flexibility. The document then provides examples of common network configuration tasks like displaying interfaces, adding IP addresses, and enabling/disabling interfaces to demonstrate how ip can be used as a replacement for ifconfig.

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    Ifconfig Vs Ip

    Uploaded by

    emka
    50 views11 pages
    This document compares the ifconfig and ip network configuration commands in Linux. Ifconfig has been used for a long time but is now deprecated, as the ip command from the iproute2 utility package provides more powerful functionality. The ip command can replace all commands from the net-tools package, including ifconfig, and performs network configuration using netlink sockets rather than ioctl for improved flexibility. The document then provides examples of common network configuration tasks like displaying interfaces, adding IP addresses, and enabling/disabling interfaces to demonstrate how ip can be used as a replacement for ifconfig.

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    ifconfig vs ip

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    This document compares the ifconfig and ip network configuration commands in Linux. Ifconfig has been used for a long time but is now deprecated, as the ip command from the iproute2 utility package provides more powerful functionality. The ip command can replace all commands from the net-tools package, including ifconfig, and performs network configuration using netlink sockets rather than ioctl for improved flexibility. The document then provides examples of common network configuration tasks like displaying interfaces, adding IP addresses, and enabling/disabling interfaces to demonstrate how ip can be used as a replacement for ifconfig.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    50 views11 pages

    Ifconfig Vs Ip

    Uploaded by

    emka
    This document compares the ifconfig and ip network configuration commands in Linux. Ifconfig has been used for a long time but is now deprecated, as the ip command from the iproute2 utility package provides more powerful functionality. The ip command can replace all commands from the net-tools package, including ifconfig, and performs network configuration using netlink sockets rather than ioctl for improved flexibility. The document then provides examples of common network configuration tasks like displaying interfaces, adding IP addresses, and enabling/disabling interfaces to demonstrate how ip can be used as a replacement for ifconfig.

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    ifconfig vs ip

    What’s Difference and Comparing Network


    Linux based distributions have featured set of commands which provide
    way to configure networking in easy and powerful way through
    command-line. These set of commands are available from ​net-tools
    package which has been there for a long time on almost all distributions,
    and includes commands like: ​
    ifconfig​, ​route​, ​nameif​, ​iwconfig​, ​iptunnel​,
    netstat​, ​arp​.

    Ifconfig Vs IP Command

    These commands are just about sufficient in configuring the network in a


    way any novice or an expert Linux user would want, but due to
    advancement in Linux kernel over past years and unmaintainable of this
    packaged set of commands, they are getting deprecated and a more
    powerful alternative which has ability to replace all of these commands is
    emerging.

    This alternative has also been there for quite some time now and is much
    more powerful than any of these commands. Rest of sections would
    highlight this alternative and compare it with one of the command from
    net-tools package i.e. ​ifconfig​.

    ip – A Replacement for ifconfig


    ifconfig​has been there for a long time and is still used to configure, display
    and control network interfaces by many, but a new alternative now exists
    on Linux distributions which is much more powerful than it. This alternative
    is ​ip​command from ​iproute2util​package.

    Although this command might seem a bit complex at first site but it is much
    broader in functionality than ​ifconfig​. It is functionally organized on two
    layers of Networking Stack i.e. ​Layer 2​(​Link Layer​), ​Layer 3​(​IP Layer​) and
    does the work of all the above mentioned commands from net-tools
    package.

    While ​ifconfig​mostly displays or modifies the interfaces of a system, this


    command is capable of doing following tasks:

    1. Displaying or Modifying Interface properties.


    2. Adding, Removing ARP Cache entries along creating new Static
    ARP entry for a host.
    3. Displaying MAC addresses associated with all the interfaces.
    4. Displaying and modifying kernel routing tables.
    One of the main highlight which separates it from its ancient counterpart
    ifconfig​is that latter uses ​ioctl​for network configuration, which is a less
    appreciated way of interaction with kernel while former takes advantage of
    netlink socket mechanism for the same which is a much more flexible
    successor of ioctl for inter-communication between kernel and user space
    using rtnetlink (which adds networking environment manipulation
    capability).

    We can now begin to highlight the features of ​ifconfig​and how they are
    effectively replaced by ​ip​command.

    ip vs ifconfig Commands
    Following section highlights some of ​ifconfig​commands and their
    replacement using ​ip​commands:

    1. Displaying all Network Interfaces in Linux


    Here, one distinguishing feature between ​ip​and ​ifconfig​is that whereas
    ifconfig only shows enabled interfaces, ip shows all the interfaces whether
    enabled or disabled.

    ifconfig Command

    $ ifconfig
    ifconfig: Check IP Address

    ip Command

    $ ip a
    ip: Check IP Address

    2. Adding or Deleting an IP Address in Linux


    The below command assigns the IP address ​192.168.80.174​to the
    interface ​
    eth0​.

    ifconfig – Add/Del IP Address

    # ifconfig eth0 add 192.168.80.174

    Syntax for adding/removing an interface using ifconfig command:

    # ifconfig eth0 add 192.168.80.174


    # ifconfig eth0 del 192.168.80.174

    ip – Add/Del IP Address

    # ip a add 192.168.80.174 dev eth0

    Syntax for adding/removing an interface using ip command:

    # ip a add 192.168.80.174 dev eth0


    # ip a del 192.168.80.174 dev eth0
    4. Add MAC Hardware Address to Network
    Interface
    The below command sets the hardware address for the interface ​eth0​to
    the value specified in the command. This can be verified by checking the
    HWaddr​value in the output of ​
    ifconfig​command.

    ifconfig – Add MAC Address

    Here, the syntax for adding MAC address using ifconfig command:

    # ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:0c:29:33:4e:aa

    ip – Add MAC Address

    Here, the syntax for adding MAC address using ip command:

    # ip link set dev eth0 address 00:0c:29:33:4e:aa

    4. Setting Other Configurations of Network Interface


    Apart from setting IP address or Hardware address, other configurations
    that can be applied to an interface include:
    1. MTU (Maximum Transfer Unit)
    2. Multicast flag
    3. Transmit Queue length
    4. Promiscuous mode
    5. Enable or disable all multicast mode

    ifconfig – Other Network Configurations

    ip – Other Network Configurations

    a. Set MTU value to 2000.

    # ifconfig eth0 mtu 2000

    # ip link set dev eth0 mtu 2000

    b. Enable or Disable multicast flag.

    # ifconfig eth0 multicast

    # ip link set dev eth0 multicast on


    c. Setting the transmit queue length.

    # ifconfig eth0 txqueuelen 1200

    # ip link set dev eth0 txqueuelen 1200

    d. Enabling or disabling promiscuous mode.

    # ifconfig eth0 promisc

    # ip link set dev eth0 promisc on

    e. Enable or disable all multicast mode.

    # ifconfig eth0 allmulti

    # ip link set dev eth0 allmulti on


    5. Enabling or Disabling Network Interface
    The below commands enable or disable specific network interface.

    ifconfig – Disable/Enable Network Interface

    The below command disables the interface ​eth0​and it is verified by output


    of ​ifconfig​which by default shows only those interfaces which are up.

    # ifconfig eth0 down

    To re-enable the interface, just replace ​down​by ​up​.

    # ifconfig eth0 up

    ip – Disable/Enable Network Interface

    The below ​ip​command is alternative for ifconfig to disable a specific


    interface. This can be verified by the output of ​'ip a'​command which
    shows all the interfaces by default, either up or down, but highlights their
    status along with the description.

    # ip link set eth0 down


    To re-enable the interface, just replace ​down​with ​up​.

    # ip link set eth0 up

    6. Enable or disable the use of ARP protocol


    The below commands enable or disable ARP protocol on specific network
    interface.

    ifconfig – Enable/Disable ARP Protocol

    The command enables ARP protocol to be used with interface ​eth0​. To


    disable this option, just replace arp with ​-arp​.

    # ifconfig eth0 arp

    ip – Enable/Disable ARP Protocol

    This command is the ip alternative to enable ARP for the interface eth0. To
    disable, just replace ​on​with ​off​.

    # ip link set dev eth0 arp on


    Conclusion
    Thus, we have highlighted features of ​ifconfig​command and how they can
    be done using ​ip​command. Currently, Linux distributions provides a user
    with both the commands so that he can use according to his convenience.
    So, which command is convenient according to you which you would prefer
    to use? Do mention this in your comments.

    If you want to learn more about these two commands, then you should go
    through our previous articles that shows some practical examples of
    ifconfig and ip command in more detailed fashion.

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