Today I tried to install KVM on the server I have running at a datacentre somwhere in France. No biggie you’d think, except that in ubuntu 18.04LTS, netplan.io is the default network configuration management tool. It plainly sucks to the point where I’m getting angry at my computer because of it. So here’s a litte rant for the people over at Canonical regarding their decision to include netplan at this stage of development

So there you have a brand new shiny release of your favourite server OS. In the past it was (very) easy to use and there was a lot of information available on the web regarding the configuration of the applications/services you need it to perform for you. I thought that I could just install the latest and greatest LTS and steam on, assuring that I’d have the latest version of all the packages I’m using and that I would be ensured of continued support.

The installation of KVM went as expected. You just do the checks and install any prerequisites to ensure you can do the install and then you just do the apt-get magic. That all went fine. However, the config I need to use requires that I set up a cloned MAC, something quite basic under the old interfaces file mechanic. However, it turns out that netplan is not yet mature enough to do this basic stuff.

WTF Canonical? Are you fucking kidding me? This stuff is basically not even out of beta, but has been promoted to the main way of managing one of the most important things on a server – the network. I can’t fucking believe you did this.

I guess it’s time to:

Keep Calm and Switch to Debian