Switching static to DHCP

[David Fletcher]

At 15:56 17/10/2006, you wrote:


>    I'm looking to switch our current, static, network to a DHCP one.
>There are several devices on the network that would need to remain 
>static, but for the most part I can switch all the client computers 
>to DHCP.  So, the question is, if I configure a DHCP server on the 
>network, define all the MAC addresses that need to retain their 
>current IPs, and then little by little start converting all the 
>client machines to DHCP, will there be any problems with those that 
>haven't been switched over yet?  In other words, will the network 
>continue to function with some machines being static and some having 
>been switched to DHCP?
>
>    And a related question, how do I define something like, say a 
> set of MAC addresses to have only a certain range of IPs?  Out 
> network is broken down into IP ranges.  .100 to .120 is the 
> management range, .50 to .60 is shipping department, .80 - .90 is 
> sales, etc., etc.  So ideally I would like the DHCP server to also 
> behave in that manner if it encounters a request coming from a 
> particular MAC.  If it belongs to a particular group, then only 
> hand out IPs from a specific range.
>
>    Thanks

So far as I know, there shouldn't be any difficulty with doing this.

What you have to do is set up the range of possible IP addresses to 
be provided, by editing /etc/dhcpd.conf. But before you do this make 
sure there is no clash with any of the static set up machines.

D