That sort of defies the allure of running Linux to begin with

Doesn't everybody? On any computer with more than one network interface, I use custom udev
rules to give each one a explanatory name ("inside" and "outside" for firewalls, "wireless"
and "wired" for my laptop, etc; the default rules make the names persistent, but you still
have to remember which is which). I've also used rules to do different things with different
USB devices that would otherwise all be undifferentiated CDC-ACM devices.