[Bug 1686784] Re: no predictable names for platform (non-PCI) NICs

[dann frazier]

Verified w/ 229-4ubuntu19. I rebuilt d-i against this update and
verified that the enahisi style names were used at boot.

I also upgraded a system with 229-4ubuntu18 to 229-4ubuntu19 where the
non-PCI platform NIC is my primary NIC. After reboot, everything came
back up as expected.

** Tags removed: verification-needed verification-needed-xenial
** Tags added: verification-done verification-done-xenial

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1686784

Title:
  no predictable names for platform (non-PCI) NICs

Status in systemd package in Ubuntu:
  Fix Released
Status in systemd source package in Xenial:
  Fix Committed
Status in systemd source package in Yakkety:
  In Progress
Status in systemd source package in Zesty:
  Fix Released

Bug description:
  [Impact]
  Systems may have NICs attached to the "platform" bus. These are NICs that are onboard, but not attached to a PCI(-like) bus. Rather, they are described by firmware directly. None of the naming policies enabled by Ubuntu by default matches these NICs, so they end up having unpredictable names. In the case where other NICs are attached (e.g. PCIe cards), the ethN enumeration race occurs, making it impossible to have an interface name that is persistent across reboots. That is, if you do a network install over "eth0", on reboot that NIC now maybe "eth3", which causes it to fail to start the network on boot.

  The HiSilicon D05 boards are an example of this. It has 4 onboard NICs
  that are described by ACPI directly, and may also have other PCIe NICs
  plugged in.

  [Test Case]
  Boot a system with the characteristics described above, and check to see if any "ethN" interfaces exist.

  [Regression Risk]
  Unless one fixed the names locally with .netlink / .rules files the interface names will change for the ACPI/platform bus network interfaces, from random ethX names to stable names named like enaVENDORMODELiX. Thus we should check that this update doesn't negatively break certified ARM64 platforms with: ARM, NVIDIA, HISILICON platform bus ethernet devices.

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