Appendix C: Adding Network Interface Cards to Your System

Overview

The easiest way to configure network interface cards (NICs) on your system is to set them up during the installation of your Linux distribution.

The next easiest method is to use either the netconfig or the linuxconf utilities. In this appendix, we'll focus on the linuxconf utility. If your distribution does not include the linuxconf utility, you can download it from http://www.solucorp.qc.ca/linuxconf/download.hc.

(If you prefer not to run utilities to modify your network configuration and would rather make the changes "manually," you can simply edit the files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts and the /etc/sysconfig directories.)

Before you can use either of these methods, you need to determine what type of NIC you are adding to your system and which kernel module (or driver) it uses.

The kernel module, or network driver software, allows the Linux kernel to work properly with your particular NIC and is normally supplied by the company that built the NIC. You will need to consult their website or documentation to find out the name of their Linux driver (they may even have instructions for compiling and installing a new version of their driver software, but normally you will not need to do this because the kernel source usually contains the driver software you need).