摘要 |
The digital network modem has a built-in Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) mechanism for dynamically assigning network addresses to clients on the local network. To prevent confusion with a potentially existing DHCP server on the local network, an autosense mechanism is provided to detect the existence of a DHCP server and disable the internal, built-in DHCP mechanism. At power-on, the modem has no knowledge of clients on the local network, and the addresses in use are checked prior to operation. Addresses in use are placed in a list in a store of unknown addresses, and are not assigned to clients requesting DHCP addresses. When a DHCP client requests an address and has as its current address one of the addresses on the list, the current address is removed from the list. The list of unusable addresses is thus minimized and the same address will not be used for two clients. |