Network Configuration: DHCP / DNS

[archived]

Any suggestions/documentation on Pluto co-existing with existing DHCP/DNS servers?

I see the benefits of using Pluto as the DHCP server.  But there are some other sevices on my network that are used to having the Windows DHCP and DNS lookup services.

[archived]

In the Pluto Admin website you can specify that the DHCP server in the Pluto Core only gives IP addresses to devices in it's database.  This way the media directors will still get the network boot service.

However you will need to tell your other DHCP server to not give IP addresses to the media director's.

This will allow network boot.   But you won't have plug-and-play.  The way our PNP works is that if you plug in a new device, like a Squeeze Box, or an IP phone, or an IP camera, it looks up the mac address against our central database to determine what type of device it is and how to handle it.

[archived]

In the Pluto Admin website you can specify that the DHCP server in the Pluto Core only gives IP addresses to devices in it's database.  This way the media directors will still get the network boot service.

However you will need to tell your other DHCP server to not give IP addresses to the media director's.

This will allow network boot.   But you won't have plug-and-play.  The way our PNP works is that if you plug in a new device, like a Squeeze Box, or an IP phone, or an IP camera, it looks up the mac address against our central database to determine what type of device it is and how to handle it.

Hi,

now I see the trick. How did you get data about MAC adresses ? Do companies provide such info ? Do tou have to conatct them ?

Where in code/scripts does this checkup happen ?

Regards,

Rob.

[archived]

now I see the trick. How did you get data about MAC adresses ? Do companies provide such info ? Do tou have to conatct them ?

There are two way to do this that come to mind:

1. Boot an operating system on them (running the kick start CD up to the point where it detects the network is good enough) and using system specific commands to find out what the network card's MAC address is (with the kick start CD, after the network modules are loaded you should be able to switch to the second console [pressing Alt+F2], and type ifconfig eth0 which should display some stuff about the network card. I didn't try this myself, but that's what I would do if I had to.

2. Start the diskless machine. It will ask for boot configuration via DHCP. This will get logged in /var/log/syslog on the Core with something like "DHCPDISCOVER" + "DHCPOFFER" (a full DHCP transaction has two more entries, but a diskless won't confirm it's IP unless it gets TFTP data too). The MAC address is listed there.
The "discover" entry looks like this:
dhcpd: DHCPDISCOVER from 00:30:59:01:e3:9a via eth1
(where the italic entry is the computer's MAC address)

Where in code/scripts does this checkup happen ?

The script that sets up the network boot environment is /usr/pluto/bin/Diskless_Setup.sh on the Core. This gets run at every boot, but can be run manually too.

Plans are to switch the MD logic so they get configured from the Core, not our central server, and when I do that I may need to run the script after you add a new MD to the Core so you don't have to do the dreaded reboot everytime.

[I think I'll file a bug report as to not allow Guest posting This time I forgot to login]

[archived]

In the Pluto Admin website you can specify that the DHCP server in the Pluto Core only gives IP addresses to devices in it's database.  This way the media directors will still get the network boot service.

However you will need to tell your other DHCP server to not give IP addresses to the media director's.

This will allow network boot.   But you won't have plug-and-play.  The way our PNP works is that if you plug in a new device, like a Squeeze Box, or an IP phone, or an IP camera, it looks up the mac address against our central database to determine what type of device it is and how to handle it.

Hi,

now I see the trick. How did you get data about MAC adresses ? Do companies provide such info ? Do tou have to conatct them ?

Where in code/scripts does this checkup happen ?

Regards,

Rob.

Hi,

thanks for detailed explanation. However I was wondering about MAC addresses in terms of plug'n'play functionality of other devices. It was explained that Pluto automatic detects device based on its MAC address ( whether it's a snom phone, or ip camera).

So I wondered about those data, how can you get them and where in scripts/code does this plug'n'play functionality happen.

Regard,

Rob.

[archived]

Hi Rob,

  There are lists on the net ( the registry of the mac allocation group i think ) with the mac address prefixes allocations per company. What we did is took that list and used the ranges in there to map a specific mac to a specific type of device. So when we see a new device we look into a specific table in the database to see what device template should that be and create a device in system of the correct type. Is not 100% exact but it should work in most of the cases.

Sincerely,
   ToMiC