Thats because the latest net-tools contains a fixed version of netstat
which works much more according to the manpage:

   --interface=iface , -i
       Display a table of all network interfaces, or the specified iface).

which means that the parameter coming after -i is the interface on
which netstat now listens.

So you either have to do

  netstat -ni

or

  netstat -i -n

now for it to work correctly again as netstat otherwise tries to read
interface "n", which obviously doesn't exsist on your machine.

Read ya, Phil

Having looked at Solaris and FreeBSD netstat man pages I tend to agree
that there should be a separate option for specifying a particular
interface, especially since passing an interface name as an argument
to -i has never worked in the past. However, now that we've "broken"
it once by making the behavior match the man page, can we do so again
to "fix" it?

As an aside, the fact that 'netstat -an -i eth0' fails with usage
message while 'netstat -an -ieth0' works is broken IMHO.

So what is the best way to fix this?   "netstat -an -i eth0" should work

Well if you can find an example of a short option that takes an optional
argument we may be able to work with that, but I can't think of any ATM. 

I see a way out if we maintain the historical behavior of -i, which is to add
-I<iface> to handle the specifying a particular interface. OTOH, if we insist on
bending the software to match the docs after all this time, I'm not sure what
can be done. Any ideas?

The netstat package is now already out and used by a customer with
that change for the -i option, so changing that back is not recommendable.

Could you please check back with the other customer if he can't change
his scripts to use netstat -ni instead of netstat -in?

Thanks,

Read ya, Phil

I will ask.

j

So I believe the complaint here is that our netstat is out-of-step
with all others. I like Dave's idea from comment #7. Is that a
possibility?

J

For comment one:
Nothing in the man pages says that the item after the '-i' is the specified 
interface.  The man pages should then read:
   --interface=iface , -i=iface 
       Display a table of all network interfaces, or the specified iface).
OR
   --interface=iface , -iiface
       Display a table of all network interfaces, or the specified iface).

This interpretation goes against the action of the command in the previous 
release, other RedHat variants and every Unix variant I could attempt.

To change the command functionality to match a bogus man page is an insane 
action. Fix the man page, not the code action.  We have automated scripts that 
work just fine in Pensacola (as well as AIX, HP/UX, and Solaris) and fail in 
Taroon.

This should be addressed in the next update. The beta RHEL3 U5 packages on RHN
should have the change you are seeking.

J

I know I'm joining the party late, but why doesn't "netstat -ni" list the IP 
information in other Unix's (AIX and Sun I know for sure do).  Is it possible to 
update the code to display the IP?
AIX (I edited out my ip):
netstat -ni
Name  Mtu   Network     Address            Ipkts Ierrs    Opkts Oerrs  Coll
lo0   16896 link#1                         6416072     0  6428625     0     0
lo0   16896 127         127.0.0.1          6416072     0  6428625     0     0

Solaris:
netstat -ni
Name  Mtu  Net/Dest      Address        Ipkts  Ierrs Opkts  Oerrs Collis Queue 
lo0   8232 127.0.0.0     127.0.0.1      86225441 0     86225441 0     0      0   
   
Thanks for any info you can provide.

Fix confirmed with:

net-tools-1.60-20E.7 (RHEL3-U5)
net-tools-1.60-37.EL4.6 (RHEL4-U1)

So moving to PROD_READY.

As for the issue in comment 32, please open a separate IssueTracker so that we
can track that issue.

An advisory has been issued which should help the problem
described in this bug report. This report is therefore being
closed with a resolution of ERRATA. For more information
on the solution and/or where to find the updated files,
please follow the link below. You may reopen this bug report
if the solution does not work for you.

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHBA-2005-445.html