I would like to add a second static IP to my local Ubuntu 11.10 desktop machine and have it automatically available after rebooting. So far I am successfully using ifconfig to to temporarily set up an alias for my primary network interface: # ifconfig eth1:0 192.168.178.3 up # ifconfig eth1 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr c8:60:00:ef:a3:d9 inet addr:192.168.178.2 Bcast:192.168.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::ca60:ff:feef:a3d9/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:61929 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:64034 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:45330863 (45.3 MB) TX bytes:28175192 (28.1 MB) Interrupt:42 Base address:0x4000 eth1:0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr c8:60:00:ef:a3:d9 inet addr:192.168.178.3 Bcast:192.168.178.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 Interrupt:42 Base address:0x4000 However, when I add the following to /etc/network/interfaces, the alias is not up and running as expected after a reboot: # vi /etc/network/interfaces auto eth1:0 iface eth1:0 inet static address 192.168.178.3 netmask 255.255.255.0 I would like to know what to configure to get this to work. As a side note, I am running gnome shell.