> >On Fri, 26 Jan 1996, Ken Nakata wrote:
> >
> >> > is programming the card with the proper IP address. However, that only
> >>means
> >>                                           ^^ ^^^^^^^
> >> You mean MAC address, right?  You can give it whatever IP address you
> >> want, but universally unique MAC address should be assigned to your
> >> Ethernet card when your vendor shipped it.
> >
> >I think when you ifconfig the ethernet card, you tell it what it's IP address
> >is and what it's netmask it, etc. so that it knows what packets to ignore and
> >which to accept. The MAC ("ethernet") address is assigned by the manufacturer
> >and (normally) is hard-coded and can't be changed.

Apology to John for misunderstanding the context.  I was thinking
about the driver reading card's MAC address out of the ROM then
writing it to the chip's MAC address register.

> Do you think it would do any good, or harm to ifconfig the card with its
> hardware address? That is rather than a made up ip address. What is the

It doesn't make sense, but it wouldn't harm if the MAC address doesn't
match to any IP address that has special meaning (e.g. loopback
address).

> effect of the hardware address being in a different format?

?  IP and MAC addresses are of entirely different concepts.  You can't
mix them up.  If you want to, it might help to read one of Stevens'
TCP/IP books (esp. vol. 1).

ken