DHCP Option 15 - domain suffix search list

(Last modified: 15Jan2003)

This document (10060439) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

goal

fact

RFC 1533 does not support multiple domain names in DHCP option 15

The Microsoft client would not know what to do with the additional information if we added support for domain name suffixes from our DHCP server.

An excerpt from article Q275553 of the Microsoft knowledge base describes the limitations and workarounds. See below

"The following methods of distribution are available for pushing the domain suffix search list to DNS clients:
Regini.exe. The Regini.exe tool from the Microsoft Windows 2000 Resource Kit can be used to place the domain suffix search list setting into the registry. A sample Regini script is provided in the "Sample Regini Script" section of this article.

Unattended installation. You can populate the domain suffix search list settings during an unattended installation.

For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
Q178277 Setting DNS Domain Suffix Search Order During an Unattended Installation

The following methods of distribution are not available for pushing the domain suffix search list to DNS clients:
Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP). You cannot configure DHCP to send out a domain suffix search list. This is a limitation of the DHCP protocol itself and not the result of limitations in any particular vendor's DHCP implementation.

Netsh (Netshell). The Netsh utility has no command to set or to change the domain suffix search list.

Group Policy. Group Policy currently does not have a mechanism for distributing the domain suffix search list.

Microsoft Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript). No application programming interfaces (APIs) are available that enable you to script a change to the domain suffix search list."

The current NetWare DHCP server does allow the distribution of a local domain name to be distributed with the IP addresses. These are the instructions "Click the DHCP Service tab on the DNS/DHCP Management console. Highlight the subnet object. Fill in the DOMAIN NAME field on the ADDRESSING tab"

A work around for your problem will be to create a ZenWorks Application object with a registry entries for the multiple domains or alternately you could use the snapshot32.exe program to record the changes the Microsoft regini.exe makes to the workstation and create a ZenWorks application from the resultant application object template file (AOT) Additionally you could create CNAME entries for all the servers with the alternate Domain names.

document

Document Title:	DHCP Option 15 - domain suffix search list
Document ID:	10060439
Solution ID:	NOVL39774
Creation Date:	13Feb2001
Modified Date:	15Jan2003
Novell Product Class:	NetWare

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