[systemd-devel] [RFC][PATCH] networkd: add a basic network daemon

[Tom Gundersen]

On Wed, Nov 6, 2013 at 7:56 AM, Holger Winkelmann [TP]
<hw at travelping.com> wrote:
> We really like to see this direct, how ever would it not better to join
> efforts for network management. I.e. arch Linux claims with netctl [1]
> to do network management "the systems way. and there are a few other
> attempts to do network managent. I.e. netconfd [2] of openWRT is doing
> network management (kind of monolitic) as a daemon as well which can
> be configured via Bus RPC. (OK ubus in this case). Not to mention
> the desktop centric network manager.

We have looked at and discussed various alternatives, in particular
with the connman guys. However, none of the existing solutions seem
amendable to what we want for the server/initrd, some are too
simplistic and e.g. does not really allow for handling the global
state that we will need, or compartmentalizes too much the different
protocols/state machines, whilst others simply have a different focus
(see Marcel's email in this thread as to why connman's focus is
different from networkd's and why it makes sense to keep them
separate).

> Can somebody explain the goals of systemd-networkd? If this just a small
> basic tool will be replaced if more features are required or a new attempt
> to for general network management?

At the moment we are focusing on the server/initrd usecase, and I
expect that to be the focus for the foreseeable future.

-t