IP Networking

I am running solaris 8 on the ultra 5 sparc. I used to have a static ip address set up and now I've moved and I'm trying to get dhcp working. I have read many man pages. My latest attempt was trying to use the ifconfig command to set this up but I'm not sure how to use it. How does my gateway get set up and how to get to the dhcp server? I have also started the dhcpagent. Do I need to do clean up from my last network configuration before trying the dhcp? Is there any easier way to do what I'm trying to do?

you can do it one of two ways:

run dhcpconfig, and configure your local machine that way

or run sys-unconfig and set up dhcp that way. I used the second way and it worked great. it modified all of the files and interfaces for me.

some who monitor this site will have you edit all of the files, but I personally like the path of least resistance (even though a lot can be said about manually editing files).

hope this helps.

thanks, I think I'll try the second way for now. does sys-unconfig take down the whole OS?

what it actually does is it brings your system down to the PROM prompt (the ok prompt), then you have to boot from there. Because this command wipes out your original network configuration, you will be placed into an interactive configuration mode upon boot. just follow the bouncing ball when it asks the questions and you should be fine. It has worked for me every time so far.

well I ran sys-unconfig and when it runs ifconfig it times out on my interface (hme0) so then nothing gets configured. it says that my interface is not configured properly. then it dumps core and runs rpc services and hangs. at this point I have to power down. any thoughts?

log into the machine as root and do an ifconfig -a.

if hme0 doesn't show up, do the following:
ifconfig hme0 plumb
ifconfig hme0 up

then run another ifconfig -a to see if it now shows in the configuration. if it doesn't after doing all of that, then you may have a bad nic. what hardware are you doing this on, because I had the same problem on an Ultra 10 last summer and they had to replace the entire mother board because the the nic is part of that.

let me know what happens. hope this helps.

ok I have an Ultra 5.
now here is the strange thing. I have run infconfig -a and yes hme0 does show up but no ip is assinged to it and it is not up. i have to manually ifconfig hme0 up to get that working. but then after that I don't know what to do. I tried to set up my gateway with route add default <address> this would be the gateway address I was assinged from my cable company. make any sense?