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Summary

Default to using NetworkManager and nm-applet where necessary rather than drakx networking.

Owner

  • Name: Claire Robinson
  • Email: eeeemail@gmail.com

Resources

This would affect desktop maintainers to a lesser extent but mainly developers, to integrate with MCC and installers. It would require wide testing, so early inclusion would be essential.

Current status

  • Targeted release: Mageia 7
  • Last updated: 2024/03/29
  • Percentage of completion: 0%

Detailed Description

Our network configuration tools are old and stable but don't integrate particularly well into modern desktop environments which expect NetworkManager. NM has become somewhat of a de-facto standard and users/reviewers often find it difficult to find their way around unfamiliar tools.

Why it would be good for Mageia to include it

Apart from the above, NM is actively maintained upstream which would reduce the surface area of our own maintenance tasks, as it would simply be included as with any other package. Desktops already expect to find it and compromises are usually made to insert our own network tools in there, but they don't integrate hugely well. ie. Gnome shows no network management applet (It's actually in the bottom panel, which is hidden and often not easily revealed.), other DE's show two.

Our own tools could be added as task-drak-net or similar which could configure things to make switching easy for those who prefer the current system.

Test case

QA process would ensure network configuration was working/simple and properly integrated into the installers. Would require testing on a wide variety of hardware, so early testing in the wider community would be called for, something we would need to reach out for via blog/forum/other at release stages.

Software / Packages Dependencies

NetworkManager nm-applet both of which are already packaged Installer

What could disrupt development of this new feature

Developer availability and lack of testing.

See also bug 10269, comment 6-8

Also see bug 8960 where the ssid being used as if it were an interface name stops shorewall from working as the name is too long.

Planning

Early inclusion (pre-alpha or by alpha2 at the latest) would be beneficial to allow wide testing on various hardware. It would also limit the likelihood of delays caused when including major changes between releases, especially as time progresses.

Contingency

It should be relatively simple to fall back on existing tools if inclusion become problematic.

Release Notes

Notes should be made about the change and procedure for switching to current tools for anybody not wishing to use it, ie. task-drakx-net, if we can create one.

Documentation

NM has an active upstream and is pretty standard for network management these days so documentation is readily available which could be included in our own and familiarity with NM is already good, for people coming from other distributions.