Operation Manual - DHCP 
Quidway S5600 Series Ethernet Switches-Release 1510  Chapter 3  
DHCP Relay Configuration
 
Huawei Technologies Proprietary 
3-3 
RFC3046 DHCP Relay Agent Information Option 
IV. Mechanism of option 82 supporting on DHCP relay 
The procedure for a DHCP client to obtain an IP address from a DHCP server through 
a DHCP relay is similar to that for the client to obtain an IP address from a DHCP 
server directly. The following are the mechanism of option 82 supporting on DHCP 
relay. 
1)  A DHCP client broadcasts a request packet when it initiates. 
2)  The DHCP relay connected to the local network receives the broadcast packet 
and checks whether the packet contains option 82.   
3)  If the packet contains option 82, the DHCP relay processes the packet depending 
on the configured policy (that is, discards the packet, replaces the original option 
82 in the packet with its own, or leaves the original option 82 unchanged in the 
packet), and forwards the packet (if not discarded) to the DHCP server. 
4)  If the packet does not contain option 82, the DHCP relay adds option 82 to the 
packet and forwards the packet to the DHCP server. The forwarded packet 
contains the port number of the switch to which the DHCP client is connected, the 
VLAN to which the DHCP client belongs, and the MAC address of the DHCP 
relay. 
5)  Upon receiving the DHCP request packet forwarded by the DHCP relay, the 
DHCP server stores the information contained in the option field and sends a 
packet that contains DHCP configuration information and option 82 to the DHCP 
relay. 
6)  Upon receiving the packet returned from the DHCP server, the DHCP relay strips 
option 82 from the packet and forwards the packet with the DHCP configuration 
information to the DHCP client. 
 
  Note: 
Request packets sent by a DHCP client fall into two categories: DHCP-DISCOVER 
packets and DHCP-REQUEST packets. As DHCP servers coming from different 
manufacturers process DHCP request packets in different ways (that is, some DHCP 
servers process option 82 in DHCP-DISCOVER packets, whereas the rest process 
option 82 in DHCP-REQUEST packets), a DHCP relay adds option 82 to both types of 
packets to accommodate to DHCP servers of different manufacturers.