title	tags	created	published
Static IP Configuration	article guide software linux config	2023-07-02T21:43:42Z	true

When installing Arch Linux on a VPS, you usually need to enable VNC and configure the networking by yourself before you can SSH into your machine. This post serves as a guide to connect your server to the internet.

Connectivity check

First of all, confirm that networking hasn't been set up yet:

ping google.com

There should be no response from the ping.

Network interface

Now let's find out the name of the network interface:

networkctl list

You should see an ethernet device named like eth0 or ens0. The number at the end will differ. This is the name of the network interface we'll configure in the following steps.

Network manager

Arch Linux uses systemd which includes the systemd-networkd network manager by default. To configure the network manager, edit the following file:

sudo vim /etc/systemd/network/20-wired.network

Start by specifying the network interface name:

[Match]
Name=ens0

Now you need to enter your IP address, subnet mask and the gateway. Ideally your VPS provider should include that data in your dashboard. You can enter the addresses in the network section:

[Network]
Address=2.1.1.2/32
Gateway=2.1.1.1
DNS=1.1.1.1

The DNS shown here is the Cloudflare DNS because it's reliable and easy to remember, but feel free to use a different DNS.

If your VPS has an IPv6 address you can add more of the same lines to the network section:

Address=1111:1111:1111::2345
Gateway=1111:1111:1111::1111
DNS=2606:4700:4700::1111

Service installation

Try to start the DNS resolver and the network manager:

sudo systemctl start systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl start systemd-networkd

Check if we're online on both IPv4 and IPv6:

ping -4 google.com
ping -6 google.com

If everything went smooth, make the DNS resolver and the network manager start automatically on boot:

sudo systemctl enable systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl enable systemd-networkd

DNS records

To finalize the setup, add an A record for IPv4 and an AAAA record for IPv6 to your DNS and your server should be fully configured.