If you want to determine the IP address of the
DHCP server
from which a Mac
OS X system received its IP address,
subnet
mask, etc., you can obtain that information from a
command-line interface (CLI), i.e., a
Terminal window by using the command ipconfig getpacket
interface where interface is the relevant network
interface, which will usually be en0 or en1.
You can issue the command ifconfig -a in a Terminal
window to see the network interfaces on the system and which have
IP addresses assigned to them.
getpacket interface-name
Prints to standard output the DHCP/BOOTP packet that the
client accepted from the DHCP/BOOTP server. This command is
useful to check what the server provided, and whether the
values are sensible. This command outputs nothing if
DHCP/BOOTP is not active on the interface, or the attempt to
acquire an IP address was unsuccessful.
When you issue the command, you will see output similar to that shown below:
$ ipconfig getpacket en0
op = BOOTREPLY
htype = 1
flags = 0
hlen = 6
hops = 0
xid = 0xceb36b13
secs = 0
ciaddr = 0.0.0.0
yiaddr = 192.168.2.51
siaddr = 0.0.0.0
giaddr = 0.0.0.0
chaddr = ac:bc:32:ce:d3:f5
sname =
file =
options:
Options count is 7
dhcp_message_type (uint8): ACK 0x5
server_identifier (ip): 192.168.2.1
lease_time (uint32): 0x15180
subnet_mask (ip): 255.255.255.0
router (ip_mult): {192.168.2.1}
domain_name_server (ip_mult): {192.168.2.1}
end (none):
$Some of the values displayed include the following:
| yiaddr: | The IP address assigned to the specified network interface on the system from which the command was issued. |
| server_identifier (ip): | The DHCP server's IP address. |
| chaddr: | The Media Access Control (MAC) address associated with the specified network interface. |
| subnet_mask (ip): | The subnet mask. |
| router (ip_mult): | The router to which network packets destined for systems outside the subnet should be sent, aka, the gateway address. |
| lease_time (uint32): | The lease time in seconds as a hexadecimal value. You can convert the hexadecimal value to a decimal value using a hexadecimal to decimal converter. In the example above hex 15180 equals decimal 86400, which is 1 day, since there are 86,400 seconds in a day. |
You can also use the ipconfig's getoption parameter to get
specific values individually.
getoption interface-name (option-name | option-code)
Prints the BOOTP/DHCP option with the given name or option
code integer value. See bootpd(8) for option code names. If
an option has multiple values e.g. domain_name_server, only
the first value is printed.
E.g., the commands below get the DHCP server IP address, the router's IP address, the subnet mask, and the domain name server's IP address. In this case the router is also functioning as the DHCP server and DNS server. You can also get the lease time in seconds and the domain name, if one has been assigned, though in the example below none has been assigned. The value below of 86,400 seconds for the lease time means the lease of the IP address is good for 1 day, since 86400 / 24 / 60 / 60 = 1. When the lease time expires, a system has to query the DHCP server again for an IP address and associated information. It may get the same IP address again.
$ ipconfig getoption en0 server_identifier 192.168.2.1 $ ipconfig getoption en0 router 192.168.2.1 $ ipconfig getoption en0 subnet_mask 255.255.255.0 $ ipconfig getoption en0 domain_name_server 192.168.2.1 $ ipconfig getoption en0 lease_time 86400 $ ipconfig getoption en0 domain_name $
