Created attachment 323734 [details] The configuration files of the bondings Description of problem: I have installed the RHEL 5.2 in a server and this server contains 3 network interface cards (Totally 6 ethernet ports). I have set those 6 ethernet ports to form 3 bondings. However, I have found that there is a strange behaviour in the OS. When I reboot the OS, the assignment of ethernet ports to the corresponding eth configuration files are randomly changed. For example, I have assigned eth0 for ethernet port 1 and then eth0 would be assigned to other ethernet ports when I reboot the OS. I have reboot the OS for 8 times and found that there are 3 times to encounter this problem. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): How reproducible: Install extra network cards. Set the related configuration files for the bondings. Just reboot the OS for several times to test. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Install the extra network cards and their related drivers. 2. Change the content in /etc/modprobe.conf to form bondings. 3. Set the network configuration files for the bondings in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts 4. Just reboot the system for several times to test. Actual results: The assignment sometimes is wrong after the reboot. Expected results: The assignment must be correct for every reboot. Additional info: I have tried to set and save the assignment of ethernet ports to the specific eth configuration files in the GNOME GUI environment, but the assignment is still randomly changed after the reboot. All the related configuration files are included in the attachment.
You need proper HWADDR= lines in your ifcfg files (or udev rules) - otherwise there's nothing to tie particular device names to devices.