omshell - OMAPI Command Shell
omshell
omshell(1) General Commands Manual omshell(1)
NAME
omshell - OMAPI Command Shell
SYNOPSIS
omshell
DESCRIPTION
The OMAPI Command Shell, omshell, provides an interactive way to con-
nect to, query, and possibly change, the ISC DHCP Server's state via
OMAPI, the Object Management API. By using OMAPI and omshell, you do
not have to stop, make changes, and then restart the DHCP server, but
can make the changes while the server is running. Omshell provides a
way of accessing OMAPI.
OMAPI is simply a communications mechanism that allows you to manipu-
late objects. In order to actually use omshell, you must understand
what objects are available and how to use them. Documentation for
OMAPI objects can be found in the documentation for the server that
provides them - for example, in the dhcpd(1) manual page and the
dhclient(1) manual page.
CONTRIBUTIONS
This software is free software. At various times its development has
been underwritten by various organizations, including the ISC and Vixie
Enterprises. The development of 3.0 has been funded almost entirely by
Nominum, Inc.
At this point development is hosted by the ISC, but the future of this
project depends on you. If you have features you want, please consider
implementing them.
LOCAL AND REMOTE OBJECTS
Throughout this document, there are references to local and remote
objects. Local objects are ones created in omshell with the new com-
mand. Remote objects are ones on the server: leases, hosts, and groups
that the DHCP server knows about. Local and remote objects are associ-
ated together to enable viewing and modification of object attributes.
Also, new remote objects can be created to match local objects.
OPENING A CONNECTION
omshell is started from the command line. Once omshell is started,
there are several commands that can be issued:
server address
where address is the IP address of the DHCP server to connect to.
If this is not specified, the default server is 127.0.0.1 (local-
host).
port number
where number is the port that OMAPI listens on. By default, this
is 7911.
key name secret
This specifies the TSIG key to use to authenticate the OMAPI
transactions. name is the name of a key defined in dhcpd.conf
with the omapi-key statement. The secret is the secret key gener-
ated from dnssec-keygen or another key generation program. The
key algorithm is assumed to be HMAC-MD5 key. If a different algo-
rithm was specified in dhcpd.conf file for the key, then it must
be specified via the key-algorithm statement.
key-algorithm algorithm
This specifies the cryptographic algorithm for the key used when
authenticating OMAPI transactions. Supported values for algorithm
are:
HMAC-MD5
HMAC-SHA1
HMAC-SHA224
HMAC-SHA256
HMAC-SHA384
HMAC-SHA512
fi
The default is HMAC-MD5. (Value is not case sensitive).
connect
This starts the OMAPI connection to the server as specified by the server
statement.
CREATING LOCAL OBJECTS
Any object defined in OMAPI can be created, queried, and/or modified.
The object types available to OMAPI are defined in dhcpd(8) and
dhclient(8). When using omshell, objects are first defined locally,
manipulated as desired, and then associated with an object on the
server. Only one object can be manipulated at a time. To create a
local object, use
new object-type
object-type is one of group, host, or lease.
At this point, you now have an object that you can set properties on.
For example, if a new lease object was created with new lease, any of a
lease's attributes can be set as follows:
set attribute-name = value
Attribute names are defined in dhcpd(8) and dhclient(8). Values
should be quoted if they are strings. So, to set a lease's IP
address, you would do the following:
set ip-address = 192.168.4.50
ASSOCIATING LOCAL AND REMOTE OBJECTS
At this point, you can query the server for information about this
lease, by
open
Now, the local lease object you created and set the IP address for is
associated with the corresponding lease object on the DHCP server. All
of the lease attributes from the DHCP server are now also the
attributes on the local object, and will be shown in omshell.
VIEWING A REMOTE OBJECT
To query a lease of address 192.168.4.50, and find out its attributes,
after connecting to the server, take the following steps:
new lease
This creates a new local lease object.
set ip-address = 192.168.4.50
This sets the local object's IP address to be 192.168.4.50
open
Now, if a lease with that IP address exists, you will see all the
information the DHCP server has about that particular lease. Any data
that isn't readily printable text will show up in colon-separated hexa-
decimal values. In this example, output back from the server for the
entire transaction might look like this:
> new "lease"
obj: lease
> set ip-address = 192.168.4.50
obj: lease
ip-address = c0:a8:04:32
> open
obj: lease
ip-address = c0:a8:04:32
state = 00:00:00:02
dhcp-client-identifier = 01:00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
client-hostname = "wendelina"
subnet = 00:00:00:06
pool = 00:00:00:07
hardware-address = 00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ends = dc:d9:0d:3b
starts = 5c:9f:04:3b
tstp = 00:00:00:00
tsfp = 00:00:00:00
cltt = 00:00:00:00
As you can see here, the IP address is represented in hexadecimal, as
are the starting and ending times of the lease.
MODIFYING A REMOTE OBJECT
Attributes of remote objects are updated by using the set command as
before, and then issuing an update command. The set command sets the
attributes on the current local object, and the update command pushes
those changes out to the server.
Continuing with the previous example, if a set client-hostname = "some-
thing-else" was issued, followed by an update command, the output would
look about like this:
> set client-hostname = "something-else"
obj: lease
ip-address = c0:a8:04:32
state = 00:00:00:02
dhcp-client-identifier = 01:00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
client-hostname = "something-else"
subnet = 00:00:00:06
pool = 00:00:00:07
hardware-address = 00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ends = dc:d9:0d:3b
starts = 5c:9f:04:3b
tstp = 00:00:00:00
tsfp = 00:00:00:00
cltt = 00:00:00:00
> update
obj: lease
ip-address = c0:a8:04:32
state = 00:00:00:02
dhcp-client-identifier = 01:00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
client-hostname = "something-else"
subnet = 00:00:00:06
pool = 00:00:00:07
hardware-address = 00:10:a4:b2:36:2c
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ends = dc:d9:0d:3b
starts = 5c:9f:04:3b
tstp = 00:00:00:00
tsfp = 00:00:00:00
cltt = 00:00:00:00
NEW REMOTE OBJECTS
New remote objects are created much in the same way that existing
server objects are modified. Create a local object using new, set the
attributes as you'd wish them to be, and then create the remote object
with the same properties by using
create
Now a new object exists on the DHCP server which matches the properties
that you gave your local object. Objects created via OMAPI are saved
into the dhcpd.leases file.
For example, if a new host with the IP address of 192.168.4.40 needs to
be created it would be done as follows:
> new host
obj: host
> set name = "some-host"
obj: host
name = "some-host"
> set hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
> set hardware-type = 1
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 1
> set ip-address = 192.168.4.40
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 1
ip-address = c0:a8:04:28
> create
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ip-address = c0:a8:04:28
>
Your dhcpd.leases file would then have an entry like this in it:
host some-host {
dynamic;
hardware ethernet 00:80:c7:84:b1:94;
fixed-address 192.168.4.40;
}
The dynamic; line is to denote that this host entry did not come from
dhcpd.conf, but was created dynamically via OMAPI.
RESETTING ATTRIBUTES
If you want to remove an attribute from an object, you can do this with
the unset command. Once you have unset an attribute, you must use the
update command to update the remote object. So, if the host "some-
host" from the previous example will not have a static IP address any-
more, the commands in omshell would look like this:
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ip-address = c0:a8:04:28
> unset ip-address
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ip-address = <null>
>
REFRESHING OBJECTS
A local object may be refreshed with the current remote object proper-
ties using the refresh command. This is useful for object that change
periodically, like leases, to see if they have been updated. This
isn't particularly useful for hosts.
DELETING OBJECTS
Any remote object that can be created can also be destroyed. This is
done by creating a new local object, setting attributes, associating
the local and remote object using open, and then using the remove com-
mand. If the host "some-host" from before was created in error, this
could be corrected as follows:
obj: host
name = "some-host"
hardware-address = 00:80:c7:84:b1:94
hardware-type = 00:00:00:01
ip-address = c0:a8:04:28
> remove
obj: <null>
>
HELP
The help command will print out all of the commands available in
omshell, with some syntax pointers.
SEE ALSO
dhcpctl(3), omapi(3), dhcpd(8), dhclient(8), dhcpd.conf(5),
dhclient.conf(5).
AUTHOR
omshell is maintained by ISC. To learn more about Internet Systems
Consortium, see https://www.isc.org
omshell(1)