Best way to extract MAC address from ifconfig's output?

Question

What is the best way to extract the MAC address from ifconfig\'s output?

Sample output:

bash-3.00# ifconfig eth0        
eth0      Link          


        

Answer 1

Use:

ifconfig eth0 | grep HWaddr

or

ifconfig eth0 |grep HWaddr

This will pull just the MAC address and nothing else.

You can change your MAC address to whatever you want:

ifconfig eth0 down,
ifconfig eth0 hw ether (new MAC address),
ifconfig eth0 up