Problem with networking?

[Bill Moran]

gcn53 at vfemail.net wrote:
> Quoting Bill Moran <wmoran at potentialtech.com>:
> 
>>I can think of a very limited number of cases where the primary IP on
>>an ethernet card should have the netmask you have.  Verify it.
>>
> 
> Sorry, forgive my ignorance, but how do I "verify it"?

I missed the earlier part of the thread, so ...

If you were given the information by your hosting provider, verify that
it's correct compared to what you have in /etc/rc.conf

Where did you get your IP addy?  You should have been provided a netmask
in the same document/conversation/whatever.

Also, based on some other replies to this thread, could you post your
/etc/rc.conf to the list.  It may help sort out what's up.

Background:
netmasks of ffffffff (i.e. 255.255.255.255) are normally used only for
1) point-to-point connections 2) IP aliases (when a NIC has more than 1
IP addy)
Using it on a broadcast NIC (such as ethernet) pretty much ensures that
no networking will go nowhere.  Basically, you're telling the IP software
that the only IP that can be reached via that card is the one the card
already has: thus the routing software can't determine where to send
packets.

Another thing you can do is simply change it to 255.255.255.0 and see if
things start to work.  It's possible that that number is wrong, but it
will break _less_ networking than using 255.255.255.255, so you'll be
able to tell if you're on the right track or not:

ifconfig fxp0 netmask 255.255.255.0

-- 
Bill Moran
Potential Technologies
http://www.potentialtech.com