A heterogeneous network may include non-Windows-based hosts that require dynamically allocated IP address and option information. DHCP supports both non-Microsoft DHCP Clients and BOOTP clients. When IP addresses are issued, DHCP Clients retain the address for a lease period. BOOTP clients, as used in many diskless workstations, do not support IP address leases. In fact, the Microsoft DHCP Server supports virtually any type of DHCP Client. You can have NetWare, UNIX, and other operating systems running that support DHCP Client services, and the Windows 2000 DHCP Server will respond to their requests. However, other operating systems may not support all DHCP options configured on the Windows 2000 DHCP Server. This does not prevent the third-party operating systems from obtaining basic IP addressing information, such as Default Gateway, IP address, and subnet mask information.
Note: The DHCP service in Windows 2000 supports any clients that are compliant with RFCs 951, 2131, and 2132. See the Resources page for these RFCs.
The MouseOver below provides some rules for providing support to various DHCP Clients.

Client support

1. Non-Microsoft DHCP: Always test the support required by non-Microsoft clients to ensure that the clients are compatible with the DHCP service in Windows 2000. These clients may require support for non-mandatory features or for vendor-specific options.
2. BOOTP: The BOOTP client requests an address each time it starts because it does not recognize an IP lease. The DHCP service in Windows 2000 supports RFC 951-compliant BOOTP clients and can be configured to reclaim the IP addresses when you remove clients from the network or turn them off. BOOTP clients are assigned dynamic IP addresses from a pool of addresses designated specifically for BOOTP clients. The DHCP Server reclaims these addresses after the lease time has elapsed and it has verified that the address is no longer in use by the BOOTP client.
3. Non-DHCP: You configure IP addresses for non-DHCP Clients manually. You can document these addresses in the DHCP Scope by manually entering them as reserved addresses. DHCP does not issue or reclaim these reserved addresses.

The next lesson wraps up this module.