.TH ifconfig 8 MintNet
.SH NAME
ifconfig \- network interface configuration
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B "ifconfig [-a|-v] [-f <filename>] [interface options]"
.SH DESCRIPTION
.I Ifconfig
is used to set and show the addresses, flags and options
of network interfaces.
.PP
When
.I ifconfig
is invoked without arguments,
it shows a table of all running network interfaces, their addresses
and flags in a human readable form.
The option
.B "-a"
forces
.I ifconfig
to display all interfaces in the system, no
matter if they are running or not. The option
.B "-f <filename>"
passes driver specific options to
.I ifconfig
. You will find descriptions for these specific options in the
README files of every driver that supports this.
.PP
When a single argument (the name of a network interface) is given,
.I ifconfig
just shows the status of this interface.
.PP
.I ifconfig
sets flags and addresses of the interface named as the first
argument when additional options are given.
.SH OPTIONS
.TP 15
.SM interface
The name of the interface to deal with.
.BR lo0 ,
and
.B sl0
are valid names for the loopback interface and the SLIP interface
(channel 0) respectively.
.TP
.SM "addr \fBinetaddr\fP"
This option causes
.I ifconfig
to set the local IP address of the interface to
.BR inetaddr .
This is the address your machine can be reached at over this interface.
.B inetaddr
can be in standard IP address dot notation or can be a symbolic name
which is resolved into an IP address.
NOTE that you must not use a symbolic name when setting up the loopback
interface, because symbolic names cannot be resolved before the loopback
interface is set up.
.TP
.SM "dstaddr \fBinetaddr\fP"
Set the point to point destination address of the interface to
.BR inetaddr ,
which
can be an IP address or a symbolic name.
This option will only work on point to point interfaces, like the
.B sl?
ones.
.TP
.SM "broadaddr \fBaa.bb.cc.dd\fP"
Set the broadcast address of the interface to
.BR "aa.bb.cc.dd" .
This defaults to the net broadcast address of the attached network, but
can be set to any valid IP address.
This option will only work on interfaces that support broadcasting, like
the
.B lo0
interface.
.TP
.SM "netmask \fBaa.bb.cc.dd\fP"
Set the subnet mask of the interface to
.BR "aa.bb.cc.dd" .
This is by default the class A, B or C netmask of the local address
of the interface set with the
.B "addr"
option.
It can be used to split a large network into many small subnetworks.
.TP
.SM up
This sets the UP flag on the interface. This is used to activate the
interface.
.TP
.SM down
This clears the UP flags on the interface. This is used to shut down
the interface.
.TP
.SM [-]arp
(De)activate usage of the ARP (address resolution protocol) protocol
for resolving IP addresses into hardware addresses.
.TP
.SM [-]trailers
(De)activate usage of trailer encapsulation for this interface.
.TP
.SM [-]debug
(De)activate debugging for this interface. Debugging is currently
a no-op.
.TP
.SM mtu NN
Set the mtu (maximum transmission unit) of the interface to NN bytes.
Better make it large enough as long as fragmentation is not implemented.
.TP
.SM metric NN
Set the metric of the interface to NN. This value is currently not used.
.TP
.SM [-]linkNN
This option sets (clears) the bit with number NN in the link level flag
word of the interface.
The flag word is 16 bits wide, so [-]link0 through [-]link15 are valid.
Bit 0 is the least significant, bit 15 the most significant bit.
.br
Link level flags are interface type specific. Thats why
.I ifconfig
only uses bit numbers instead of meaningful names for them.
Currently only SLIP interfaces support link level flags.
Bit 3 turns auto compression on: if set and a VJ compressed SLIP
frame is received the interface enables compression for outgoing frames.
Bit 4 is the compression bit: if set VJ header compression is enabled.
.SH AUTHOR
Kay Roemer <roemer@rbi.informatik.uni-frankfurt.de>
Torsten Lang <Torsten@Lang.net>
.SH SEE ALSO
.IR route(8).