[Toybox] complaining about 'ifconfig' - better use 'ip'

[Rob Landley]

On 04/04/2013 03:17:17 AM, Bastian Bittorf wrote:
> * Rob Landley <rob at landley.net> [04.04.2013 10:03]:
> > I've used "ip" a couple times. I mostly use ifconfig, because it's
> > there and I see no upside in using "ip". I also use iwlist and
> 
> iwlist is also dead since a long time, the successor is 'iw'
> which shares/imitates to 'ip' syntax

For a definition of "dead" that's installed by default on current  
ubuntu LTS.

> > ifenslave and tunctl and various other tools. Does ip have some kind
> > of plugin architecture to suck all that into one big monolithic
> > command?
> 
> there is not plugin-arch, just one command which simply
> manipulates the kernels netlink-interface.

A very large, very complicated command in the mold of systemd.

Busybox was not simpler than 20-something other packages because it  
implemented everything they did in a single binary. It was simpler in  
SPITE of that. This is something the  
http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=crunchgen&sektion=1 people  
never quite understood.

> > >if you are
> > >really using 'ifconfig', you should better switch now. the
> > >pain will be much worse if you wait again 2 years...
> >
> > In what way? I vaguely recall first hearing about "ip" back under  
> Red
> > Hat 9, which shipped in 2003. So I've been successfully largely
> > ignoring it for 10 years now. What's queued up to change in the near
> > future?
> 
> i will. there is no work done anymore on ifconfig, even the manpage
> says to switch.

You keep saying that, but like so many other things you've said you  
don't back it up, and what I can see disagrees with what you say.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt of using the version of ubuntu  
you're using (which is newer than the LTS I'm using), here is the man  
page for ifconfig:

   http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/precise/en/man8/ifconfig.8.html

Please point me to the text you were referring to. I can't find it.

Note: if you mean _ip_ command's man page says that ifconfig is  
obsolete, this is exactly as convincing to me as Microsoft saying Linux  
is obsolete. You'll notice I'm not claiming that busybox is obsolete  
and everyone should stop using it, because that would be a seriously  
dick move. People are free to continue using that as long as they like,  
it's a free country. If toybox isn't better enough to convince them to  
switch on their own, obviously I still have work to do.

> > Is there a standard on this? I'm happy to implement a standard...
> 
> there is no standard, just reallive (like the mount or init-command):
> every developer in the network world has realized, that doing the
> 'ifconfg/route/arp/netstat'-thingy was a dead-end-street.

Hmmm, it's not http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum when  
they're invisible, I think it's  
http://barb.velvet.com/humor/lurkers.html except you're claiming  
_every_ eveloper thinks the same way as you do. That there are none who  
don't.

I'm not a developer in the network world, apparently. Neither are the  
people who do android. Neither are any of the other developers I've  
seen piping up in this thread. Neither are the (multiple) developers  
who sent me an ifconfig implementation. Neither is cray, my current  
employer, which bolted an an "arp" implementation on to klibc for use  
in initramfs. (I could go on...)

As far as I can tell you've been repeatedly factually wrong without  
acknowledging or correcting one instance of it that I've noticed so  
far. I'm trying not to hold this _against_ the "ip" command, but it's  
not giving me warm fuzzies so far.

Look: fconfig and friends are not coming out. Android toolbox has  
ifconfig, thus toybox needs ifconfig. The question is whether or not it  
needs "ip" on top of that, and I must admit you're not doing the best  
job of advocacy I've seen recently.

> bye, bastian

Rob