How in the name to disable modules?

[exkor5000]

Hi

I am trying to disable a module from loading and whatever I do it still keeps loading up.

I placed a blacklist entry (/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist):

blacklist tg3

I reboot the system and the module has been loaded.

Ok! so I open /etc/modprobe.conf and add this:

alias tg3 off
alias eth0 off

reboot the system and the module still loaded!

ok, that drove me mad and I started digging through the individual rc scripts and /etc/sysconfig scripts. Finding nothing useful I just disabled the whole network section for all run levels with:

chkconfig network off

I reboot the system and the module has been loaded like nothing has changed.

How can I disable a module from loading??

In Slackware it's straight forward, just comment the module out in /etc/modules.conf and you're good to go.

In RHEL I don't even understand what script loads what modules and how to find out what module is loaded by what script... is there a tool for that??

[Lazydog]

Ok! so I open /etc/modprobe.conf and add this:
Code:

alias tg3 off
alias eth0 off

This does not tell the system to not load them. This just set an ALIAS to call them by.

man modprobe.conf

[exkor5000]

That's what I thought too but that's how, apparently, you do it in RHEL.

Check this link:
kbase.redhat.com/faq/docs/DOC-8711

I read that in the redhat docs first but I can't pin point to the exact location anymore.

[reed9]

You can add a line to /etc/modprobe.d/modprobe.conf reading

install tg3 /bin/true

That way anything that causes the module to load will just return success and exit, preventing the module from ever loading.

[exkor5000]

You can add a line to /etc/modprobe.d/modprobe.conf reading
Code:

install tg3 /bin/true

That way anything that causes the module to load will just return success and exit, preventing the module from ever loading.

success my friend, many thanks!

now I gotta find out what was loading this module in the first place.

do you think kudzu? or maybe the scripts in "/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/"?

I have checked /etc/sysconf/hwconf, I saw all the devices but not that particular network interface (tg3 which is an alias for eth0), I am assuming kudzu was not able to detect it? if not then what loads it? how can I check?

Thanks

[HROAdmin26]

Google: linux tg3 => The tg3 driver is for Broadcom NIC's

[exkor5000]

Google: linux tg3 => The tg3 driver is for Broadcom NIC's

Yes I know that and you can download the driver from that website in addition to some FAQ but I still don't know what script in RHEL fires this module up originally.

[exkor5000]

i mean im pretty sure that the scripts in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts take care of that but I don't see how that module gets associated with the hardware explicitly.

For example in /etc/sysconfig/hwconfig you can see the hardware detected with the module that is being loaded for that particular hardware. I didn't see anything similar for that tg3 module, so I what I don't understand, and trying to, is how this module being loaded? how does the system know what module to associate with that NIC?


Thanks

[HROAdmin26]

From a RHEL 4.7 X64 machine's hwconf:

class: NETWORK
bus: PCI
detached: 0
device: eth0
driver: e1000
desc: "Intel Corporation 82541GI Gigabit Ethernet Controller"
network.hwaddr: 00:14:22:23:XX:XX
vendorId: 8086
deviceId: 1076
subVendorId: 1028
subDeviceId: 016d
pciType: 1
pcidom:    0
pcibus:  6
pcidev:  7
pcifn:  0

And from a RHEL 5.3 X64 hwconf:

class: NETWORK
bus: PCI
detached: 0
device: eth0
driver: e1000
desc: "Intel Corporation 82545EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller (Copper)"
network.hwaddr: 00:0c:29:0b:XX:XX
vendorId: 8086
deviceId: 100f
subVendorId: 15ad
subDeviceId: 0750
pciType: 1
pcidom:    0
pcibus:  0
pcidev: 11
pcifn:  0

What NIC is in the machine?

lspci | grep -i ethernet

Was this a clean install or a restore from another machine/backup?

[waterhead]

Just blacklisting a module should be enough to prevent it from loading. I know that this works with wireless driver modules, so it should work for the NIC driver. I suspect there was something wrong with the way you added it to the blacklist file.