[NTLUG:Discuss] Booting - no Ethernet

[Dennis Rice]

I am running Fedora 11 and 12 on both my HP Laptop (home) and Dell 
towers (work) and have noticed that more and more, the Ethernet 
interface does not come up after the boot has been completed.  Once the 
situation starts, it exists from that point on.  Basically, Fedora is 
failing to start the interface during the boot process.  I must manually 
start the interface using either the Network app or the command ifup ethX.

Does anyone have any insight as to why and what I can do to fix the 
problem.  I am teaching basic system operation and server configuration, 
so not doing anything unusual (I think:-).

Along with this, Firefox now always starts in the Offline Mode.  Is 
there some setting someplace that has been set by the app to alway start 
in that mode?  I would like to de-select it.  I understand it doing if 
the Ethernet has been disabled, but if it is working before I start, 
then Firefox should not start in the Offline mode.

Appreciate,
Dennis