Why is adding a new Ubuntu PC to an existing LAN such a pain?

[John R Cichy]

On Sun, 2007-01-21 at 09:58 +0100, Dieter Schicker wrote:
> IMHO this in not an issue of "static" or "dynamic".
> 
> Where exactly is the pain in filling in 7 lines in a file and then
> restarting a service????
> 
> 1) /etc/network/interfaces:
> 
> auto eth0
> iface eth0 inet static
>         address w.x.y.z
>         netmask 255.255.255.0
>         network x.y.z.0
>         broadcast x.y.z.255
>         gateway x.y.z.1
> 
> 2) /etc/init.d/networking restart
> ---------------------------------
> 
> Dieter
> 

None if your network is truly static (as I said in another post, I did
this for years), but what happens when you want to replace your gateway
machine because your neighbor just got a core duo and 'threw out' his
1.2ghz pentium, with dhcp you can build your new box using the old
gateway, then turn off old machine off and everything will just work,
where the static system will make you go to all the boxen to change that
gateway info.

John