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Re: Setting MAC addr on ethernet cards?

To: Ben Greear <greearb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: Setting MAC addr on ethernet cards?
From: Jeremy Weatherford <xidus@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2000 18:22:15 -0800 (PST)
Cc: "netdev@xxxxxxxxxxx" <netdev@xxxxxxxxxxx>
In-reply-to: <38B87955.B545160A@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sender: owner-netdev@xxxxxxxxxxx
I'll admit being ignorant of higher-level cards, but to my knowledge, MAC
addresses are fixed, like a serial number, on the network card.

Having the ability to pick your MAC address on a local LAN would cause the
same problems as putting your card into promiscuous mode -- you could
intercept traffic intended for other machines.  I really don't see this as
being likely.

Thus, I'm almost certain that the cards these drivers support don't allow
anything like this.  I can't promise that for higher-end cards, though.

Jeremy Weatherford
xidus@xxxxxxxxx
http://xidus.net

On Sat, 26 Feb 2000, Ben Greear wrote:

> I took a peek at the rtl and tulip drivers, and neither implement
> the ability to set the MAC address.  (ifconfig shows the MAC is
> set, but the card won't accept the pkts unless it's in promisc mode.)
> 
> Was this not implemented in these drivers because the hardware
> doesn't support it, or just because the coders didn't get around
> to it?
> 
> If it's the latter, anyone wanna volunteer a patch? :)
> 
> -- 
> Ben Greear (greearb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)  http://scry.wanfear.com/~greear 
> Author of ScryMUD:  scry.wanfear.com 4444        (Released under GPL)
> http://scry.wanfear.com
> 


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