How can I make my eth0 connection default on startup?

Question

I'm running kubuntu 9.10 and every time I log in auto eth0 is used instead of my custom connection called "batnet". I have batnet set to automatically connect, but despite this it is ignored and the default auto eth0 is used instead. This would be fine IF I could somehow figure out how to define a static ip for auto eth0. I would prefer to just make the 'batnet' connection default. How can I do this?

Answer 1

For static assignment on Debian-based systems, you need to edit /etc/network/interfaces.

example:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
        address 208.88.34.106
        netmask 255.255.255.248
        broadcast 208.88.34.111
        network 208.88.34.104
        gateway 208.88.34.110

to change it back to DHCP:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

Answer 2

You could put a script in /etc/init.d/ to run on startup that would turn off eth0;

sudo ifconfig eth0 down