netprofile screencast
After a very helpful feedback on cooker mailing-list, I decided to post a more in depth screencast which illustrates how netprofile works.
Let’s think about a simple use case. You are using your notebook at home, and everything is fine. However, every time you have to go to work, you have to change several settings related to your network connection, proxy configuration and firewall. Of course, you can do it all manually, or even wrap out a script, but.. there is no need for it with the new netprofile!
So, the goal of this post is to illustrate how to accomplish this task with new netprofile and updated drakx-net applications.
The first thing you have to do is to go to draknetprofile application, and create a new network profile (Update: scroll down to the botton of the post to see the actual draknetprofile screenshots):
draknetprofile graphical interface
When you create a new profile, you have to give it a name (for example, work):
Creating new network profile
After you are finished, this new profile will be created and, automatically, activated:
New network profile was created and activated
From now on, whey you use other drakx-net application, they will detect that you have multiple network profiles, and show you some helpful text to let you know what profile you are using currently. So you can configure your firewall:
firewall configuration with new network profile
Your network connections:
Configuring network settings for new network profile
Your proxy settings:
proxy configuration for new network profile
And other network settings you want:
network center displaying currently used profile
When you go back home, you simply right-click on the net_applet tray icon and activate the default profile again:
net_applet switching profiles
And this will (almost) instantly restore your settings stored on the default profile:
draknetcenter with default profile
You can repeat this procedure for any other profile and configuration. Of course, if you do not want to use netprofile at all, everything will just work.
I hope this clarifies a bit the netprofile application, and how it can help you to simplify your life in different network environment.
EDIT: Updating this post, this is how draknetprofile looks in Mandriva 2010 Beta:
Default netprofile view, with modules details hidden in Advanced section
Advanced view of draknetprofile, showing modules configuration
Well, you don’t have to understand how it works. It just works
. The modules part will be moved into a ‘advanced’ button in a near future, so you won’t have to touch them at all (unless you want.. but in this case you certainly know what you are doing 
).
And, like I said, if you don’t want to use it, just don’t use it! That’s simple.
“However, every time you have to go to work, you have to change several settings related to your network connection, proxy configuration and firewall.”
I usually suspend my laptop before leaving, and resume it at a new location, not rebooting, and not logging in or out. Does the proxy settings support work in this scenario (or, are we relying on environment variables)? I’ve actually been meaning to set WPAD up at work to allow the browser to figure it out itself.
What would be really nice is automatic detection of which profile to use (e.g., if connected to this wifi network, I am at home, or if this is my default gateway, I am at work), and (if it’s not available already) changing/enabling/disabling vpn connections.