Package: iwd,systemd Severity: wishlist Hello Jonas, Luca and other systemd maintainers,
I am using iwd (for wireless interfaces) and systemd-networkd (for wired interfaces) and this mostly works like a charm. There is one aspect that works less than ideal in the default configuration and it is route metrics. With networkd, a simple DHCP=yes .network file typically does the job for ethernet interfaces and things just work once plugging a cable. Likewise, iwd recognizes configured networks and connects to them automatically. Both tend to install a default route and this is where it gets interesting. The existence of multiple routes actually is beneficial, because existing network connections don't have to die. When establishing a new connection, Linux selects the preferred route via its metric value. Both tools override Linux default. iwd defaults to RoutePriorityOffset=300 and systemd-networkd #defines DHCP_ROUTE_METRIC as 1024. When both interfaces are configured, wireless is preferred, but that is rarely what we want as network cables typically offer higher speed. Changing this is easy enough. Setting a differen RoutePriorityOffset on the iwd side is a one-line change as is setting RouteMetric in the .network file. I am wondering whether these defaults are useful or whether we may consider changing them for a better default behavior. Of course changing defaults bears downsides. Users may have come to rely on the current defaults, so it would be a breaking change. Deviating from upstream on the Debian side may cause surprises. So it's not obvious that a change is beneficial from a global perspective. If both of you disagree with changing them, please tag this bug wontfix and close it. Helmut
