OpenBSD dhclient

Chris Turner c.turner at 199technologies.org
Fri Mar 14 16:43:59 PDT 2008


Chris Turner wrote:
I like the priv. separation, etc. but I seem to recall having some 
problems with openbsd's DHCP w/r/t config file syntax or parsing at some 
point - am using their ports (ISC) version of the server on my openbsd 
boxes - cant recall if this isolated to the server or global and I never 
reported it there - will try and dig a little deeper & post here ..

personally, that's my only objection, if it bears fruit.. not sure what 
everyone else thinks w/r/t maintinance, etc.

aha.. though I nuked that particular workspace (doh!) -
enough remains in the notes to see that the problem was that dhcpd's
dhcpd.conf parser had diverged and that the older version in openbsd did 
not like things like

host mybox.199technologies.org {

    ...

}

as anything passing e.g. isdigit() following a '.' was assumed to be an 
IP address .. aka "199technologies.org" confused it..

ISC's parser has been enlightened and can handle this now.

This doesn't seem to affect dhclient type statements since the only
'block's are based on interface names and not host-or-IP strings..
so my particular objection is moot ..

though as I recall, some options are different w/r/t support for 
'dynamic dns' - which has improved / changed in v3 (over openbsd's code).

I guess it's the usual tradeoff between security & features..

my ideal preference would be to have the nifty Open features (security) 
merged into the ISC client/server release (advanced dhcpitude) and 
reimported cleanly as a single unit.. but hey.. I guess I'm an idealist

I defer ..

- Chris





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