How can I display eth0's IP address at the login screen on Precise Server?

Question

The server I administrate, inconveniently enough, has a dynamic IP address assigned by DHCP. The convenient counterbalance, though, is that it happens to be set up about two feet from where I sit. I know how to edit /etc/issue to show different values before the login prompt is delivered to the display, but I'd like to know if it's possible for /etc/issue to display the current IP address of eth0 (re-evaluated at boot time) so that I can see it and then ssh in without having to log in to run ifconfig.

Answer 1

/etc/issue is unfortunately a plain text, it has some options you can add to it (see man agetty) but not the IP Address of eth0..

Try and put this in /etc/rc.local:

IP=$(/sbin/ifconfig eth0 | grep 'inet addr:' | cut -d: -f2 | awk '{ print $1}')
echo 'eth0 IP: $IP' > /etc/issue

This is untested .. so you might need to tweak a bit.