[SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

ludog · 2023-04-19 09:27:46

I'm connecting to wifi using wpa_supplicant, systemd-networkd and systemd-resolved, as described here. However, sometimes the device names appears as wlp58s0, and sometimes as wlp59s0. My setup expects the former, so it breaks when it's the latter (takes an extra 90s to boot, and then wifi is unavailable).

I expect disabling predictive device naming, as described here would mean it is always wlan0, so kinda solve the problem, but I'd like to get to the bottom of why it's happening because AFAIK predictive device names shouldn't change like this. Looking at journalctl, I see that the times it ends up as wlp58s0, the full device name (right terminology?) ends in "3a:00.0"; when it ends up as wlp59s0, it ends in "3b:00.0".

Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3a:00.0 wlp58s0: renamed from wlan0

vs

Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3b:00.0 wlp59s0: renamed from wlan0

Full journalctl when it works: https://bpa.st/Z5P2Y

Full journalctl when it doesn't work: https://bpa.st/L3K4E

 >>> sudo lspci

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 8th Gen Core Processor Host Bridge/DRAM Registers (rev 07)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 6th-10th Gen Core Processor PCIe Controller (x16) (rev 07)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation CoffeeLake-H GT2 [UHD Graphics 630]
00:04.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/E3-1500 v5/6th Gen Core Processor Thermal Subsystem (rev 07)
00:08.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/v6 / E3-1500 v5 / 6th/7th/8th Gen Core Processor Gaussian Mixture Model
00:12.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH Thermal Controller (rev 10)
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH USB 3.1 xHCI Host Controller (rev 10)
00:14.2 RAM memory: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH Shared SRAM (rev 10)
00:15.0 Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH Serial IO I2C Controller #0 (rev 10)
00:15.1 Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH Serial IO I2C Controller #1 (rev 10)
00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH HECI Controller (rev 10)
00:17.0 SATA controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake Mobile PCH SATA AHCI Controller (rev 10)
00:1b.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH PCI Express Root Port #17 (rev f0)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH PCI Express Root Port #1 (rev f0)
00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH PCI Express Root Port #5 (rev f0)
00:1d.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH PCI Express Root Port #9 (rev f0)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake LPC Controller (rev 10)
00:1f.3 Audio device: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH cAVS (rev 10)
00:1f.4 SMBus: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH SMBus Controller (rev 10)
00:1f.5 Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH SPI Controller (rev 10)
3b:00.0 Network controller: Qualcomm Atheros QCA6174 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter (rev 32)
3c:00.0 Unassigned class [ff00]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTS525A PCI Express Card Reader (rev 01)
3d:00.0 Non-Volatile memory controller: Samsung Electronics Co Ltd NVMe SSD Controller SM981/PM981/PM983

Last edited by ludog (2023-04-19 14:53:40)

Lone_Wolf · 2023-04-19 11:47:47

Good name

Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: dcdbas dcdbas: Dell Systems Management Base Driver (version 5.6.0-3.4)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: idma64 idma64.1: Found Intel integrated DMA 64-bit
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: iTCO_wdt iTCO_wdt: Found a Intel PCH TCO device (Version=6, TCOBASE=0x0400)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: iTCO_wdt iTCO_wdt: initialized. heartbeat=30 sec (nowayout=0)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: AVX2 version of gcm_enc/dec engaged.
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: AES CTR mode by8 optimization enabled
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: proc_thermal 0000:00:04.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: input: Dell WMI hotkeys as /devices/platform/PNP0C14:03/wmi_bus/wmi_bus-PNP0C14:03/9DBB5994-A997-11DA-B012-B622A1EF5492/input/input10
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain package
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain dram
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: queried max coordinates: x [..5664], y [..4646]
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: queried min coordinates: x [1278..], y [1206..]
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: Your touchpad (PNP: DLL087c PNP0f13) says it can support a different bus. If i2c-hid and hid-rmi are not used, you might want to try setting psmouse.synaptics_intertouch to 1 and report this to linux-input@vger.kernel.org.
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: DSP detected with PCI class/subclass/prog-if info 0x040380
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: Console: switching to colour dummy device 80x25
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: i915 0000:00:02.0: vgaarb: deactivate vga console
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3a:00.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:24:28 Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3a:00.0: pci irq msi oper_irq_mode 2 irq_mode 0 reset_mode 0

bad name

Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: dcdbas dcdbas: Dell Systems Management Base Driver (version 5.6.0-3.4)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: FAT-fs (nvme0n1p1): Volume was not properly unmounted. Some data may be corrupt. Please run fsck.
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: videodev: Linux video capture interface: v2.00
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain package
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain core
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain uncore
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain dram
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel_rapl_common: Found RAPL domain psys
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: intel-lpss 0000:00:15.1: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: idma64 idma64.1: Found Intel integrated DMA 64-bit
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: iTCO_vendor_support: vendor-support=0
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: ee1004 0-0050: 512 byte EE1004-compliant SPD EEPROM, read-only
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: proc_thermal 0000:00:04.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: queried max coordinates: x [..5664], y [..4646]
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: iTCO_wdt iTCO_wdt: Found a Intel PCH TCO device (Version=6, TCOBASE=0x0400)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: iTCO_wdt iTCO_wdt: initialized. heartbeat=30 sec (nowayout=0)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: queried min coordinates: x [1278..], y [1206..]
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: psmouse serio1: synaptics: Your touchpad (PNP: DLL087c PNP0f13) says it can support a different bus. If i2c-hid and hid-rmi are not used, you might want to try setting psmouse.synaptics_intertouch to 1 and report this to linux-input@vger.kernel.org.
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: input: Dell WMI hotkeys as /devices/platform/PNP0C14:03/wmi_bus/wmi_bus-PNP0C14:03/9DBB5994-A997-11DA-B012-B622A1EF5492/input/input10
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: DSP detected with PCI class/subclass/prog-if info 0x040380
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: usb 1-12: Found UVC 1.00 device Integrated_Webcam_HD (0c45:671d)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: input: Integrated_Webcam_HD: Integrate as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:14.0/usb1/1-12/1-12:1.0/input/input11
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: usbcore: registered new interface driver uvcvideo
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3b:00.0: enabling device (0000 -> 0002)
Apr 19 09:25:56 Umber kernel: ath10k_pci 0000:3b:00.0: pci irq msi oper_irq_mode 2 irq_mode 0 reset_mode 0

It looks like the system is not consistent wrt the order it brings up devices.

Apr 19 09:25:55 Umber kernel: DMI: Dell Inc. XPS 15 9570/0F3DC8, BIOS 1.22.1 10/12/2021

Is this the latest firmware version dell has available for your system ?

Is fastboot enabled in firmware ?

Please post your /etc/mkinitcpio.conf .

ludog · 2023-04-19 12:55:15

I don't know about the firmware, never configured or updated it manually. I bought the laptop in 2018. The motherboard was replaced last year.

>>> cat /etc/mkinitcpio.conf
# vim:set ft=sh
# MODULES
# The following modules are loaded before any boot hooks are
# run.  Advanced users may wish to specify all system modules
# in this array.  For instance:
#     MODULES=(piix ide_disk reiserfs)
MODULES=()
#nvidia
#nvidia_modeset
#nvidia_uvm
#nvidia_drm

# BINARIES
# This setting includes any additional binaries a given user may
# wish into the CPIO image.  This is run last, so it may be used to
# override the actual binaries included by a given hook
# BINARIES are dependency parsed, so you may safely ignore libraries
BINARIES=()

# FILES
# This setting is similar to BINARIES above, however, files are added
# as-is and are not parsed in any way.  This is useful for config files.
FILES=()

# HOOKS
# This is the most important setting in this file.  The HOOKS control the
# modules and scripts added to the image, and what happens at boot time.
# Order is important, and it is recommended that you do not change the
# order in which HOOKS are added.  Run 'mkinitcpio -H <hook name>' for
# help on a given hook.
# 'base' is _required_ unless you know precisely what you are doing.
# 'udev' is _required_ in order to automatically load modules
# 'filesystems' is _required_ unless you specify your fs modules in MODULES
# Examples:
##   This setup specifies all modules in the MODULES setting above.
##   No raid, lvm2, or encrypted root is needed.
#    HOOKS=(base)
#
##   This setup will autodetect all modules for your system and should
##   work as a sane default
#    HOOKS=(base udev autodetect block filesystems)
#
##   This setup will generate a 'full' image which supports most systems.
##   No autodetection is done.
#    HOOKS=(base udev block filesystems)
#
##   This setup assembles a pata mdadm array with an encrypted root FS.
##   Note: See 'mkinitcpio -H mdadm' for more information on raid devices.
#    HOOKS=(base udev block mdadm encrypt filesystems)
#
##   This setup loads an lvm2 volume group on a usb device.
#    HOOKS=(base udev block lvm2 filesystems)
#
##   NOTE: If you have /usr on a separate partition, you MUST include the
#    usr, fsck and shutdown hooks.
HOOKS=(base udev autodetect modconf block filesystems keyboard fsck)

# COMPRESSION
# Use this to compress the initramfs image. By default, gzip compression
# is used. Use 'cat' to create an uncompressed image.
#COMPRESSION="gzip"
#COMPRESSION="bzip2"
#COMPRESSION="lzma"
#COMPRESSION="xz"
#COMPRESSION="lzop"
#COMPRESSION="lz4"

# COMPRESSION_OPTIONS
# Additional options for the compressor
#COMPRESSION_OPTIONS=()

seth · 2023-04-19 13:50:08

AFAIK predictive device names shouldn't change like this

YKW (you know wrong)
This is *exactly* what this "feature" does.
It generates the NIC name from the hardware position.
If you've multiple ethernet or wifi devices (like 0.1% of all desktop users) and the hardware position doesn't change, that's great.
If you're one of the 99.9% of desktop users that have zero to one ethernet or wifi chips, it's completely pointless complexity and does nothing but harm when the firmware changes the HW order what will happen
1. on BIOS/UEFI updates (eg. from a parallel windows)
2. you physically alter the hardware
3. you logically alter the hardware (eg. w/ a UEFI setting)
4. somtimes a lingering rfkill (if there's a hibernating windows, 3rd link below)
5. the UEFI is heristic to begin with

Feel free to search the forum for threads where we're collectively shitting on this broken solution searching for a problem and unless you've more than 2 wifi NICs, disable this nonsense.
(Fyi, merely installing iwd will disable it, because iwd cannot handle the name-change…)

ludog · 2023-04-19 14:52:17

Thanks, sounds worth disabling alright.

I'll explore the possible causes you list to see which one(s) it is.

Arch Linux

#1 2023-04-19 09:27:46

[SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

#2 2023-04-19 11:47:47

Re: [SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

#3 2023-04-19 12:55:15

Re: [SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

#4 2023-04-19 13:50:08

Re: [SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

#5 2023-04-19 14:52:17

Re: [SOLVED] Network device name keeps changing

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