Configure Ethernet DSL w/ static IP

Question

My Ubuntu computer connects to the router through an ethernet cable. The router is connected to the phone line. No other cables or devices are used.

How can I configure Ubuntu's "Network Manager" to work with my Speedtouch 516 ethernet router ? (My ISP uses static IPs rather than dynamic IPs.)

This is what I did so far by reading various tutorials but it will not work :

1. Configure router to "bridge mode" and DHCP disabled. (I go to http://192.168.1.254 to access my router's config.)

2. add my user name to the dev group in /etc/group

3. /etc/network/interfaces

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

4. /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf

[main]
plugins=ifupdown,keyfile
[ifupdown]
managed=true

5. In the Network Manager GUI I go to the "DSL" tab:

a.) write in user name and password
b.) choose manual:
The gateway is 192.168.1.254 right ?
Where do I get the info for: Address and Netmask ?
For DNS, I use Google's: 8.8.8.8, 8.8.4.4

6. /etc/init.d/network-manager restart

Answer 1

For Static IP assignments, you need to get that information (along with gateway and network mask details) from your ISP. Some ISPs use .254 for the gateway, while others use .1, plus a few rare ones that use other addresses. The network masks do vary as well depending on the size of the network block you're in.

In Unix we normally configure the IP addresses using /etc/ifconfig.YOUR_NIC_IDENTIFIER (where "YOUR_NIC_IDENTIFIER" varies depending on your configuration, OS, etc.). It seems that you might be using some other system that oversees that (which is also fine as long as you know it works that way).

Regarding DNS, that's normally configured in the /etc/resolv.conf file. You might want to consider using local DNS server software on your own system though -- on many Operating Systems, ISC Bind is included, and the defaults will often work just fine as a caching resolver. This can actually be more efficient since it's local, and your local resource consumption can be very low.