[systemd-devel] [PATCH 17/17] networkd: add dhcp server support

[Patrik Flykt]

On Tue, 2014-05-27 at 13:39 +0200, David Herrmann wrote:
> I strongly disagree. One major example is Wifi-P2P which requires a
> DHCP-Server for ad-hoc P2P connections. A network-daemon manages the
> local address-space, so it should also be responsible of assigning
> those ranges to an ad-hoc DHCP server.
> 
> In most current network-solutions it is awfully hard to integrate
> ad-hoc DHCP networks. Yes, everyone can configure a static
> pre-assigned DHCP range, but that's not going to work with dynamically
> created networks. This includes p2p-connections like Wifi-P2P, but
> also stuff like tethering, virtual devices and containers.

I strongly agree with David here. Any form of tethering or WiFi P2P in
addition to uplink network setup involving DHCPv4 clients just becomes
impossible to maintain in a consistent way if the client and server
parts are loosely coupled. With the wild west of IPv4 private addressing
there needs to be a consistent and quick way of reacting to the newly
acquired IPv4 subnet should it conflict with the existing one(s) handed
out locally by the DHCPv4 server. This of course applies towards the
client end usage as a virtual server/container setup is a more strictly
controlled environment.


Cheers,

	Patrik