I just switch every system to systemd-networkd immediately. The same .ini sytax as for service files, and dependencies are easy to handle, e.g. on one system I have two physical Interfaces eth0 and eth1, I want two vlans on eth0, and then bridge one of those vlans with eth1 and then run a DHCP client on that bridge but at the same time assign an additional IP address. This is dead simple to describe with one .ini file per vlan/bridge. Seriously the first time I feel like I'm not fighting an archaic config syntax, fixing up crap in some post-hook.d script, or give up entirely on any config language and just have a convoluted script setting up everything manually.
It's also easy to explicitly express "weird" stuff like "run DHCP client and use all the config options except the default route". Seriously a couple times I needed to do dumb shit and was like "there's no way they let you do this" but no, there's a way to do it.
And I'm pretty positive the config files will stay stable over the coming years and any new networking features will get appropriate config options in newer versions.
Eh, I could. But I'm quite sure that the method of switching to systemd-networkd also requires the same if not much more maintenance as simply changing the ifconfig template every few years...
I really don't care about interface configurations that much. It's an annoyance, but one that's quite easy to fix. I think introducing yet another network configuration here isn't the answer, but my linux fleet just run k8s anyway and network config on the linux level is quite simple before we get into cillium/istio/etc :}
Sure, I made that choice at a time where after upgrading, Ubuntu suddenly wanted netplan, debian stayed with /etc/network/interfaces and I think fedora went with networkmanager. So I though f- it, they all have systemd so I'll give networkd a spin. And never looked back.
So maybe don't just switch out of the blue right now if you've got a working setup, but maybe keep it in mind for the next time. :)
It's also easy to explicitly express "weird" stuff like "run DHCP client and use all the config options except the default route". Seriously a couple times I needed to do dumb shit and was like "there's no way they let you do this" but no, there's a way to do it.
And I'm pretty positive the config files will stay stable over the coming years and any new networking features will get appropriate config options in newer versions.