ifconfig: ioctl (SIOCAIFADDR): File exists - but not only with alias command

[Raimundo Santos]

Hello list,

I have a quad port Intel NIC and I am stucked on this problem: whenever I
try to modify the address of one port of this NIC, I see from ifconfig

ifconfig: ioctl (SIOCAIFADDR): File exists

Here is the status of one port:

# ifconfig igb1
igb1: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500

options=401bb<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,JUMBO_MTU,VLAN_HWCSUM,TSO4,VLAN_HWTSO>
        ether 00:1b:21:5a:93:31
        inet6 fe80::21b:21ff:fe5a:9331%igb1 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x2
        nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>
        media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex>)
        status: active

As you can see, no inet address. Try to put an address that was used before
in the same port of this NIC, and..


# ifconfig igb1 XX.XX.XX.20/28
ifconfig: ioctl (SIOCAIFADDR): File exists

I have routed running with this /etc/gateways:

ripv2
if=tun0 no_rip
if=tun1 no_rip
if=et0 no_rip
if=et1 no_rip
if=igb2 no_rip
if=igb3 no_rip
rdisc_interval=45
no_ag
no_super_ag
subnet=X.Y.Z.56/30,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.0/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.8/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.16/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.24/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.32/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.40/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.48/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.64/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.72/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.80/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.88/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.96/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.104/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.112/29,1
subnet=X.Y.Z.120/29,1

The problem occurs when configuring the primary address or an alias in any
port, after unconfigure some other address.

Using

# uname -a
FreeBSD XXX 9.1-RELEASE-p4 FreeBSD 9.1-RELEASE-p4 #10: Thu Aug  1 19:04:09
BRT 2013     XXX:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/XXX_KERNEL  amd64

A custom system with 0 thru 15 FIBs, FWD in ipfw, and VNET/VIMAGE all
enabled.

Thank you!
Raimundo Santos