USB Ethernet test

[Mikus Grinbergs]

Kevin, here is how my XOs communicate:

 1)  I haven't seen any reason to ever go to Gnome -- instead I've
written several scripts which I run from Terminal, and which set up
communication between XOs (when it hasn't been setup automatically).

 2)  Much of my inter-XO communication has been using (NON-adhoc) mesh.
 [I've written scripts to turn (non-adhoc) mesh on/off, and scripts to
turn ad-hoc wireless on/off.]

     Until very recently, I have __NOT__ tried Associating to the same
Access Point in order to communicate between XOs.  When my trial network
has included an XO-1.5 (which does not currently support plain mesh),
I've been able to use the ad-hoc (XO initiated) network instead of a
plain mash network in order to communicate between my test XOs.

 3)  So far, all of my internet connections have gone through a local
ethernet LAN.

     [Note:  in the XO, which 'eth_' gets assigned to the ethernet seems
to be somewhat hit or miss.  If, when installing a new build, the
"wrong" name gets assigned -- I edit
/etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules and correct the name to what I
want.]

     [Note:  once in a while an XO would fail to communicate with the
ethernet.  My bypass has always been to unplug the ethernet cable from
the XO, wait some seconds, then plug the cable back in.  Usually,
Network Manager recognizes "communications interface became present" --
and sets up the software for properly accessing that interface.]

 3a) When I was using F7-based or F9-based XO builds, my local ethernet
LAN had a DHCP server on it -- that DHCP server dynamically assigned
IPv4 addresses to the XOs plugged in to that LAN.  I __NEVER__ recall
having a problem communicating between XOs via the ethernet (though very
few Activities were able to collaborate).

 3b) About the time I started using F11-based XO builds, the hardware
system housing my DHCP server gave out.  I've been too lazy to set up a
new DHCP server -- so for the last year I've been running without one on
my ethernet LAN.  I have defined static IPv4 addresses for the desktop
systems on the ethernet LAN.  The XO (e.g., via the Sugar control panel)
does not support assigning an XO a static IPv4 address -- so I've
written a script with which I do that.  [I have to run that script every
time I restart the session, or replug the ethernet cable.]

     [Note:  Network Manager (or Avahi?) periodically overrides the
static IPv4 address I assign.  This happens infrequently enough that I
simply re-run my script.]

----

> collaboration does not seem to work without the route commands

I have not yet figured out when specifying a "default route" is
absolutely necessary.  I've noticed that "multi-cast" seems used for
collaboration -- so I make sure to run yet another script which issues
(using a functioning interface) 'ip route add 224.0.0.0/4'.


mikus