ne(4)
Name
ne − Second Generation Ethernet Chip Interface
Syntax
device ne0 at ibus? vector neintr
Description
The ne interface provides access to a 10 Mb/s Ethernet network through the Digital’s Second Generation Ethernet Chip (SGEC) based controller.
The host’s Internet address is specified at boot time with an SIOCSIFADDR ioctl. The ne interface employs the address resolution protocol described in arp() to map dynamically between Internet and Ethernet addresses on the local network.
The ne driver normally tries to use a trailer encapsulation to minimize copying data on input and output. This can be disabled for an interface by setting the IFF_NOTRAILERS flag with an SIOCSIFFLAGS ioctl. Trailers are only used for packets destined for Internet hosts.
The SIOCSPHYSADDR ioctl can be used to change the physical address of the adapter and the SIOCRPHYSADDR ioctl can be used to read its physical address.
The SIOCADDMULTI and SIOCDELMULTI ioctls can be used to add or delete multicast addresses. The SGEC recognizes a maximum of 16 multicast addresses.
The SIOCRDCTRS and SIOCRDZCTRS ioctls can be used to read or read and clear the Ethernet driver counters. The argument to these two ioctls is a pointer to a counter structure, ctrreq, found in <net/if.h>.
The SIOCENABLBACK and SIOCDISABLBACK ioctls can be used to enable and disable the interface loopback mode respectively.
Diagnostics
The diagnostic error messages contain relevant information provided by the ne driver. For example,
ne%d: self test failed <reason lists>
Adapter did not pass the power-up self-test during autoconfiguration time.
ne%d: write CSR0 failed
The ne driver was unable to set the initial value for the adapter.
ne%d: couldn’t allocate ......
The ne driver was unable to allocate memory for the internal data structures. ne%d: can’t handle af%d
The interface was handed a message with addresses formated in an unsuitable address family, and the packet was dropped.
ne%d: memory error (MERR)
A host memory problem or a memory parity error has occurred.
ne%d: SIOCADDMULTI fail, multicast list full
Too many multicast requests have been made.