System Administration Guide: IP Services

Macro Processing by the DHCP Server

When the DHCP server processes a macro, it places the network options and values defined in the macro in a DHCP message to a client. The server processes some macros automatically for clients of a particular type.

For the server to process a macro automatically, the name of the macro must comply with one of the categories shown in the following table.

Table 11–3 DHCP Macro Categories for Automatic Processing

Macro Category 

Description 

Client class 

The macro name matches a class of client, indicated by the client machine type, operating system, or both. For example, if a server has a macro named SUNW.Sun-Blade-100, any client whose hardware implementation is SUNW,Sun-Blade-100 automatically receives the values in the SUNW.Sun-Blade-100 macro.

Network address 

The macro name matches a DHCP-managed network IP address. For example, if a server has a macro named 10.53.224.0, any client connected to the 10.53.224.0 network automatically receives the values in the 10.53.224.0 macro.

Client ID 

The macro name matches some unique identifier for the client, usually derived from an Ethernet or MAC address. For example, if a server has a macro named 08002011DF32, the client with the client ID 08002011DF32 (derived from the Ethernet address 8:0:20:11:DF:32) automatically receives the values in the macro named 08002011DF32.

A macro with a name that does not use one of the categories listed in Table 11–3 can be processed only if one of the following is true:


Note –

When you configure a server, a macro that is named to match the server's name is created by default. This server macro is not processed automatically for any client because it is not named with one of the name types that cause automatic processing. When you later create IP addresses on the server, the IP addresses are mapped to use the server macro by default.