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7.16. biosdevname

Updated biosdevname packages that fix multiple bugs and add various enhancements are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.
The biosdevname packages contain a udev helper utility which provides an optional convention for naming network interfaces; it assigns names to network interfaces based on their physical location. The utility is disabled by default, except for on a limited set of Dell PowerEdge, C Series and Precision Workstation systems.

Note

The biosdevname packages have been upgraded to upstream version 0.4.1, which provides a number of bug fixes and enhancements over the previous version. (BZ#825142)

Bug Fixes

BZ#751373
The biosdevname utility ignored the SMBIOS version check for PCI network adapters. Consequently, PCI network adapter interfaces were renamed according to PCI slot and port numbers on systems with unsupported SMBIOS versions. With this update, the new biosdevname utility ensures that if the SMBIOS version is not supported, PCI network adapter interfaces are not renamed. As a result, PCI network adapters are named with the kernel default name in the scenario described.
BZ#804754
When using Single Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV) with embedded network interface devices, the biosdevname utility did not check the System Management BIOS (SMBIOS) type of the physical function for corresponding virtual functions. Consequently, biosdevname did not find SMBIOS type 41 structure for the device virtual functions and did not suggest interface names for these onboard network interfaces. With this update, biosdevname now looks up the SMBIOS type 41 structure for the device virtual functions in the corresponding physical function table. As a result, onboard network devices with virtual network interfaces are now renamed according to the biosdevname naming scheme.
BZ#815724
The biosdevname utility did not handle PCI cards with multiple ports. Consequently, only the network interface of the first port of these cards was renamed according to the biosdevname naming scheme. An upstream patch has been applied and biosdevname now handles PCI cards with multiple ports. As a result, all ports of multiple port PCI cards are now renamed according to the biosdevname naming scheme.
All users of biosdevname are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these bugs and add these enhancements.