DHCP retries on boot

[John Riedel]

Hi, I have a HPUX 11.0 system on a cable modem at home, (spare box from work). The DHCP server doesn't always respond quickly, and about every other system boot I get a message to root that the DHCP lease is still valid, but it could not contact the DHCP server. I also see that the dhcpclient process is not running.

Can I change the number of times or the timeout value on bootup to wait for the DHCP server. It looks like /sbin/auto_parms has two lines that start
DHCP_NUM_PKTS_TO_SEND=2
DHCP_TIME_BTWN_PKTS=5
however, this doesn't seem like it will be supported if I edit the file. I expect any time a apply a patch, that it may be reset if auto_parms is updated.

Does HP have a supported way to make this change?

[Berlene Herren]

Make sure your bootptab has
ba:by itself and the card does not have a broadcast address associated with it. This may help.

Berlene

[John Riedel]

Thanks, but I have no control over the Bootp/DHCP server, I can't see how they have it setup. Even if they have or don't have these flags, it doesn't help if a dhcp request gets lost on busy net, I need to extend the timeout and/or try a few more times.

This is jst part of how bootp/dhcp works, the client, my hpux machine broadcasts, it doesn't even know what subnet it is on at first. Since we don't have the full tcp/ip triple handshake and nothing other to make sure the packet and respnose gets back to me, we can only keep send our request and hope someone hears it. Of course we have to give up at some point. This is what I need to change; when do we give up talking to the dhcp/bootp server.