Here is the situation:

I just installed Ubuntu Server 14.04 and then noticed a change when it ask me to configure the network.

Instead of the traditional “eth0” and “eth1” I had “p2p1” and “p2p2”

My first question was: What is p2p1 mean?

Servers often have multiple Ethernet ports, either embedded on the motherboard, or on add-in PCI cards.

Linux has traditionally named these ports ethX, but there has been no correlation of the ethX names to the chassis labels – the ethX names are non-deterministic. Starting in your brand new Linux distribution, Ethernet ports will have a new naming scheme corresponding to physical locations, rather than ethX.

Ethernet ports embedded on server motherboards will be named em<port_number>, while ports on PCI cards will be named p<slot_number>p<port_number>, corresponding to the chassis labels.

Additionally, if the network device is an SR-IOV Virtual Function or has Network Partitioning (NPAR) capability, the name will have a suffix of _<virtual_function> or _.

Second question was: How do I fix it?

[Read more…]