# bad decision to mask oldnet use flag in openrc!

## lefsha

May be I'm only one, who knows..,

but I really can't understand why it was necessary to change the structure of network scripts

if the old one just works.

I guessing that Gentoo developers are children which have no idea what means reliability!

what means support! what means simplicity!

It seems they have not learned the well known statement yet: "Never touch the working system"

Otherwise I really can't understand why anyone need to hurry and not only provide a new interface to

the network starting scripts, but more then this to mask the "oldnet" use flags in the recent openrc version.

After a some update I've had realized, that my network did not work anymore.

I was really surprised by that fact. It took me sometime to understand what was going on.

 :Idea:  (having no connection is not easy to google and find out what's wrong)

Well, I've had added "oldnet" USE flag to make.conf and network has continued to work.

Recently I've realised that "oldnet" flag is masked... What a news...

Someone decided that the transition time of less then a week is absolutely enough for all people

around the world to change their scripts... What a naivety...

I'm really surprised by that movement of Gentoo developers...

Just because of that stupid decision, sorry I really can't found other word for that, people have to spend

time to adjusting their scripts without having ANY DOCUMENTATION.

Neither tutorial nor howto has been made for that purpose. No aprobation time. Nothing!!!

And what a goal has been achieved? What was the point? What kind of improvement has been made?

Nothing! None! Zero!

Since a couple of days the all new versions of openrc has been masked at all my machines.

And it will remain so, cause I do not have a clue how to setup a new network and see no point

to do it if it works without it.

And even if there is a some great idea hiding behind all this transformation, which I can't understand

either because of poor education or because of too little brain, or because of being drunk every day.

One could write a message. Still remember, that emerge has such a feature like news?

Put there link to the documentation how to setup the network in every particular case

and wait of users response at least half a year and only then mask the oldnet flag.

I'm wondering why such things need to be explained and not naturally are coming to the mind of developers.

Guys take a look on RedHat, which is successful company. Learn from them at least something...

Think why they do things in totally other way then Gentoo developers do.

I'm really disappointed by you.

P.S. Please kids, turn on your best movie and skip this message. Many thanks in advance.

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## zyko

I think you are mistaken. According to the changelog, "oldnet" is the default starting with openrc-0.5.1-r1 and cannot be disabled. That's why the USE flag is gone.

On the other hand, removing the simplified network stuff altogether deservers a rant thread all of its own  :Wink: 

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## lefsha

```
[ebuild     U ] sys-apps/openrc-0.5.2 [0.5.1] USE="ncurses unicode -debug -pam (-oldnet%*)" 0 kB
```

-oldnet !!!

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## zyko

Look at /usr/portage/sys-apps/openrc/ChangeLog:

```
*openrc-0.5.1-r1 (15 Oct 2009)

  15 Oct 2009; Mike Frysinger <vapier@gentoo.org> +openrc-0.5.1-r1.ebuild,

  openrc-9999.ebuild:

  Rewrite the oldnet handling and make it the default for everyone.
```

That's why the USE flag has been removed. It's the default now. You can't toggle it off, so there's no need for a USE flag.

And I was wrong above, the new handling of networking hasn't been removed. The old and new settings coexist in openrc-0.5.2. You get /etc/init.d/network, but you also have /etc/init.d/net.lo.

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## Hu

 *lefsha wrote:*   

> Just because of that stupid decision, sorry I really can't found other word for that, people have to spend
> 
> time to adjusting their scripts without having ANY DOCUMENTATION.
> 
> Neither tutorial nor howto has been made for that purpose. No aprobation time. Nothing!!!

 

So Baselayout and OpenRC Migration Guide does not count?  I seem to recall it being announced rather prominently quite a while ago.

 *lefsha wrote:*   

> One could write a message. Still remember, that emerge has such a feature like news?
> 
> Put there link to the documentation how to setup the network in every particular case
> 
> and wait of users response at least half a year and only then mask the oldnet flag.

 

As of when I last checked, openrc was not marked stable on any architecture.  Generally speaking, users who run ~arch are at a higher risk of problems, and are expected to be able to handle occasional breakage.  Waiting half a year seems excessive for a package that is still only accessible to power users.

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## d2_racing

We are trying how to figure this out actually : https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-796647.html

Right now, we are testing some solution, but if you use a wired dhcp config, then it's a pretty simple migration.

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## sera

 *lefsha wrote:*   

> May be I'm only one, who knows..,
> 
> but I really can't understand why it was necessary to change the structure of network scripts
> 
> if the old one just works.

 

It only just works because there was someone putting a lot of effort into it and it continues to work probably for a long time. Just if it breaks there is no one to fix it anymore. And that's fine too because it wasn't ever in stable.

 *Quote:*   

> I guessing that Gentoo developers are children which have no idea what means reliability!
> 
> what means support! what means simplicity!

 

Actually Gentoos networking is kind of buggy and the replacement simpler, more reliable and the only one to have support in future. On top it's faster.

 *Quote:*   

> It seems they have not learned the well known statement yet: "Never touch the working system"

 

Thats only true for users and certainly not for a distro and why actually do you touch your running system? You are even running unstable on purpose.

 *Quote:*   

> Otherwise I really can't understand why anyone need to hurry and not only provide a new interface to
> 
> the network starting scripts, but more then this to mask the "oldnet" use flags in the recent openrc version.
> 
> After a some update I've had realized, that my network did not work anymore.
> ...

 

The useflag was +oldnet. So if you had just updated without touching anything your network would have worked as always. The removal of the oldnet useflag is to take you another possibility to break your sytem.

 *Quote:*   

> Just because of that stupid decision, sorry I really can't found other word for that, people have to spend
> 
> time to adjusting their scripts without having ANY DOCUMENTATION.
> 
> Neither tutorial nor howto has been made for that purpose. No aprobation time. Nothing!!!

 

You have a lot of time for the transition and long before you are forced to do so there are all sorts of guides. Till then you have to work with manpages which are of high quality btw.

 *Quote:*   

> One could write a message. Still remember, that emerge has such a feature like news?
> 
> Put there link to the documentation how to setup the network in every particular case
> 
> and wait of users response at least half a year and only then mask the oldnet flag.
> ...

 

Without it being available users couldn't give feedback to write the documentation (the one you are seeking).

 *Quote:*   

> I'm really disappointed by you.

 

You shouldn't be using ~arch.

PS: Why does halve of ~arch users not know how to start a connection manually?

----------

## lefsha

 *Hu wrote:*   

>  *lefsha wrote:*   Just because of that stupid decision, sorry I really can't found other word for that, people have to spend
> 
> time to adjusting their scripts without having ANY DOCUMENTATION.
> 
> Neither tutorial nor howto has been made for that purpose. No aprobation time. Nothing!!! 
> ...

 

Surely not. There no words how to setup the network by using the new style. I mean it literally.

The old style have worked since I've installed Gentoo first for 6 years.

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## d2_racing

In fact, that's why we need to write a guide or a wiki inside the forum until the release of an official guide.

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## lefsha

 *Hu wrote:*   

> As of when I last checked, openrc was not marked stable on any architecture.  Generally speaking, users who run ~arch are at a higher risk of problems, and are expected to be able to handle occasional breakage.  Waiting half a year seems excessive for a package that is still only accessible to power users.

 

Hm. No problem. How should I setup my network if I'm not a power user?

Is it still possible? - So far I know nothing is possible without root permissions at Linux.

And you ask people to be a power use just to use network??? Are you kidding?

What if I would ask you to know CPU spec to watch the movie on your PC?

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## lefsha

 *d2_racing wrote:*   

> We are trying how to figure this out actually : https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-796647.html
> 
> Right now, we are testing some solution, but if you use a wired dhcp config, then it's a pretty simple migration.

 

That is nice, but the main statement in my message was that first Documentation have to be ready

before anyone starts to move to the new configuration. Not in opposite way what has been done in reality.

Another thing is. Not everyone uses dhcp to connect to the network. Look back in the documentation

of Gentoo networking. There are some more options... Nothing is covering all of them. Up to now!

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## NeddySeagoon

lefsha,

The original openrc-5.2 had -oldnet as the default.  As you say, that broke networking as the old net.lo was removed and replaced with the much simpler network script, that needs a lot of help.  That help is not yet available in gentoo.

There was then a openrc-5.2-r1 released that had oldnet as the default, so everything worked as before.

The most recent release forces on oldnet, so if you want to go with the new networking script, you need to know how to fix forced use flags.

Users who run ~ARCH need to keep a get out of jail free card, either by setting FEATURES="buildpkg" and keeping old binaries around or by keeping old source tarballs, so they can do emerge =openrc-<last-working-version to get back to a working system. ~ARCH does break from time to time and its always a surprise. We run it to smooth the way for its packages going stable.

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## lefsha

 *sera wrote:*   

>  *lefsha wrote:*   May be I'm only one, who knows..,
> 
> but I really can't understand why it was necessary to change the structure of network scripts
> 
> if the old one just works. 
> ...

 

Really? I could never get the point why some packages in Gentoo marked stable and some not.

I see no relation to its stability. The old scheme has worked more then 6 years for me without failure.

It's hard to find threads where people discuss that something related to /etc/conf.d/net is not

working... What kind of prove do you need to call it stable???

For example ext4 is totally crap. But people use it in main stream kernel. The same is about btrfs.

Reiser4 which is much more stable and reliable then both of them is even not in the kernel.

Marked as stable doesn't mean stable and vice versa.

Surely someone put a lot of efforts to make it work. I've never heard that things can be done by them self...

So I see no points in you words.

 *sera wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Actually Gentoos networking is kind of buggy and the replacement simpler, more reliable and the only one to have support in future. On top it's faster.

 

Faster what? Network connection? Are you kidding? You'll better think before you say something.

How can something which doesn't work, which has not been proven for a long time be reliable????

Do you understand the words you are using  :Question: 

 *sera wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Thats only true for users and certainly not for a distro and why actually do you touch your running system? You are even running unstable on purpose.
> 
> 

 

Since when openrc has been marked stable ?

Are you really using Gentoo? Please check.

 *sera wrote:*   

> 
> 
> PS: Why does halve of ~arch users not know how to start a connection manually?

 

Why do users of Intel CPUs not know what material has been used for the metal gate

and which process has been utilized?

Hint: 90% of available software not marked as stable in Gentoo. OpenRC is very good example for that.

Why do people which try to teach others not know about it?

----------

## think4urs11

 *lefsha wrote:*   

> Since when openrc has been marked stable?

 

Thats exactly the point.

Besides that please calm down.

----------

## lefsha

 *NeddySeagoon wrote:*   

> 
> 
> There was then a openrc-5.2-r1 released that had oldnet as the default, so everything worked as before.
> 
> 

 

I see it. Thanks. But why it was necessary to make all this noise to take people off their work

which is _not the developing of Gentoo_ and let them look around and fix things which hasn't been touched for years and which never made any trouble.

What is the reason to make some work, which causes more work by other people and which give them

NO advantages, but costs time?

Is Gentoo so perfect that nothing else could be done to improve it besides this networking?

I can give a lot of examples what can be done to make it better instead of this.

Are there any project managers which make tasks priority, organize and motivate people to

do certain staff? Is there any structure in the developers team?

To my opinion the story with openrc was a mismanagement issue. And it wasn't related to

programming itself. I was able to solve the problem by myself, but I was angry due to the time

I've lost for nothing.

I'm happy if it's working again.

----------

## NeddySeagoon

lefsha,

openrc is developed outside of Gentoo. Please read

this thread - all of it and keep in mind that the author of openrc is posting there.

----------

## Mike Hunt

Hi lefsha, 

I used openrc-5 both the old way and the new way, and both work equally well, I get the exact same result. both ways. The only difference that I see is that the new way is much, much easier to configure and use.

Yes, it is new, and we are all just learning about it - which can be a lot of fun too. 

Cheers.  :Smile: 

----------

## sera

 *Quote:*   

>  *sera wrote:*   
> 
> Actually Gentoos networking is kind of buggy and the replacement simpler, more reliable and the only one to have support in future. On top it's faster. 
> 
> Faster what? Network connection? Are you kidding? You'll better think before you say something.
> ...

 

I know very well what I say. Faster in regard of boot time, if not obvious you could just ask instead of calling others names.

Reliable as I now use the tools which work since the 90's and where called by a very complex wrapper script which didn't made it fully into baselayout2.

 *Quote:*   

>  *sera wrote:*   
> 
> Thats only true for users and certainly not for a distro and why actually do you touch your running system? You are even running unstable on purpose.
> 
>  
> ...

 

 :Crying or Very sad:  May someone help me  :Exclamation: 

 *Quote:*   

>  *sera wrote:*   
> 
> PS: Why does halve of ~arch users not know how to start a connection manually? 
> 
> Why do users of Intel CPUs not know what material has been used for the metal gate
> ...

 

On your so much better RedHat I had to bring up the interfaces manually for many years, respectively write my own script, don't spout nonsense.

As your tone really piss me off that's the last time I react on your provocation and at the moment I'd really like to propose the removal of ACCEPT_KEYWORDS from make.conf and make it only available with a patch not directly available in portage. You are obviously not capable of handling unstable, not because of lack of knowledge but personality.

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## NeddySeagoon

Its a wise man who knows he can have the last word but chooses not to.

Let that be an end to the flames or this thread will be locked.

----------

## lefsha

 *Mike Hunt wrote:*   

> Hi lefsha, 
> 
> I used openrc-5 both the old way and the new way, and both work equally well, I get the exact same result. both ways. The only difference that I see is that the new way is much, much easier to configure and use.
> 
> Yes, it is new, and we are all just learning about it - which can be a lot of fun too. 
> ...

 

If it's so easy, why there is no tutorial on how to setup pppoe with the new scheme?

I've found many such comments like your about new openrc. It doesn't help to setup network in any

respect and it sounds to me like cool words people are saying just for being cool.

Just a logical question. How could anything you are still learning about be easier then something

you already know? How can some work be easier then absent of that work?

I would prefer to explain something you do know or ask people if you don't.

Saying  "It was too easy for me to setup" doesn't really help to anyone.

Writing the post I was thinking not only about myself, but also about many people which even can't

ask for the help in english. They were stuck with that issue till the package has been updated.

I may be wrong with my appeal, but how to explain that openrc has been updated 3 times in just 4 days...

Why not just to accept it and try to avoid such things in the future?

Why try to hide the problem and make it like everything was fine and nothing has happened?

Why to make from the person who says something you don't like an idiot, who can't manage

his system?

Why bad things can't be called bad and good can't be called good?

What a society we are living in?

Do you really like it?

----------

## sera

I'm sorry to got caught in this flaming. Seems you have calmed down too. 

When you say that 0.5.2 was a mistake because it didn't try to install the old networking alongside the new one if the user didn't request it, I agree.

There are several methods to deal with such a case and if you do not feel like dealing with it right now just mask the package.

Only for stable there needs to be thorough documentation. Unstable might change several times before hitting stable. At the time baselayout2 becomes stable I can imagine there being a script to make the transition for you.

If the man page isn't enough ask the questions you have in this forum or on irc. 

Create a separate thread "How to setup pppoe under openrc-0.5.x?"

Describe what you have and what you want and I'm sure you get an answer within 48h. Till then use the old script for this connection. Such a thread becomes automatically a tutorial for the rest of gentoo.

You emphasis something you know is simpler then something new. Have a look at post 6022394. If you can tell me what's going wrong here and how to fix it I'll accept that argument.

Hint: there are two things going wrong.

cheers sera

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## d2_racing

 *sera wrote:*   

> If the man page isn't enough ask the questions you have in this forum or on irc. 

 

The thread exist because there is no man page at the moment.

----------

## sera

 *d2_racing wrote:*   

>  *sera wrote:*   If the man page isn't enough ask the questions you have in this forum or on irc.  
> 
> The thread exist because there is no man page at the moment.

 

```
man pppd
```

 available if you have net-dialup/ppp installed, which is a requirement for pppoe maybe since dawn of time.

Sure pppd is not that easy to handle.

----------

## UberLord

 *sera wrote:*   

> 
> 
> ```
> man pppd
> ```
> ...

 

PPP is one of the motivations for me doing the new networking. I can never get PPP to work and I don't actually use it myself, but am expected to support it (at least in OpenRC). The setup is incredibly complex for what should be a simple task these days and the goal of the new networking script is to encourage easy to use and well documented network setup tools. Not insanely complex wrapper scripts that are very prone to breakage.

That's my last post on the matter in this thread  :Smile: 

----------

