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    KEA DHCP - lacking features

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved DHCP and DNS
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    • johnpozJ
      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @RobbieTT
      last edited by johnpoz

      @RobbieTT said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

      reservations from Kea are not actually supported.

      Like in the full product, or with pfsense current deployment of it.. How can a dhcp server not have reservations?

      edit: ok it has to just be in pfsense deployment of it currently

      https://www.isc.org/kea/
      Kea supports two database backends; MySQL and PostgreSQL. Choose to store leases, host reservations, or shared configuration data in a separate database backend. Benefits of this include:

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      RobbieTTR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • RobbieTTR
        RobbieTT @johnpoz
        last edited by

        @johnpoz

        I'm only talking pfSense.

        โ˜•๏ธ

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        • M
          michmoor LAYER 8 Rebel Alliance @RobbieTT
          last edited by

          @RobbieTT said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

          efore it went live it was suggested that encouraging users to leave ISC for Kea was rather over done, considering its immaturity.

          Yep and this was definitely confusing. We know its BETA but also the strong encouragement to use it now as a replacement didnt make sense. Its not feature-complete.

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          • maverickwsM
            maverickws
            last edited by

            Thank you all for your replies.

            Ok will be looking forward for the final product and stick to ISC for now, but notice there's deprecation warnings everywhere suggesting people to migrate, it makes one believe it is already a matured implementation. Cheers

            RobbieTTR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • RobbieTTR
              RobbieTT @maverickws
              last edited by

              @maverickws

              Well we may question veracity of the warnings but they did provide a check-box to disable it.

              โ˜•๏ธ

              maverickwsM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • maverickwsM
                maverickws @RobbieTT
                last edited by

                @RobbieTT well yeah, I mean if it still needs so much polishing, and that's fine, just don't push the warnings like that just yet. Announce it some other way, have the January release put the warnings (if hopefully the implementation is more advanced).
                That'd be a strategy I'd understand.

                RobbieTTR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • RobbieTTR
                  RobbieTT @maverickws
                  last edited by

                  @maverickws - Yep.

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • jimpJ
                    jimp Rebel Alliance Developer Netgate
                    last edited by

                    There is a bit of confusion above. Static mappings/"reservations" in Kea work. It's the DNS resolution/integration that does not work yet.

                    And yes there are several missing features yet but bear in mind a significant portion of users don't use all of the available features. Most just use the basic functionality.

                    Remember: Upvote with the ๐Ÿ‘ button for any user/post you find to be helpful, informative, or deserving of recognition!

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                    • RobbieTTR
                      RobbieTT @jimp
                      last edited by

                      @jimp

                      No real confusion, just an absence of formal documentation. Other than the release notes I have not seen anything substantive on the subject. There is nothing in the pfSense online documentation and there is no mention of Kea under DHCP. If there was a white-paper / technical paper on the subject I have yet to find it.

                      The only concern I was aware of in the dev/beta stage was the inclusion of a warning banner encouraging a switch away from ISC. As the release notes for v23.09 make clear, Kea on pfSense is only in 'Feature Preview' Stage and gaps are expected.

                      As we stand, there is a GUI warning about continuing to use ISC and a warning in the release notes about using Kea. I'm not sure having a warning in place for both ISC and Kea is appropriate in production software.

                      โ˜•๏ธ

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                      • jimpJ
                        jimp Rebel Alliance Developer Netgate
                        last edited by

                        The docs don't mention Kea because the goal is eventually to have feature and UI parity and having to keep all the docs updated as things are addressed would be quite a lot more work that would just be undone in a couple months. Once it's complete there won't be many differences in the UI between ISC/Kea.

                        The warnings are both accurate. ISC is EOL and people should consider switching. The features needed for the bulk of users are there and work and many if not most users could switch and barely notice a difference in behavior. However, since it isn't feature complete, the warning about that in the release notes/blog/etc is necessary and accurate.

                        The users who post on the forum/social media in general tend to be more advanced and sure they may want/need some features that aren't there yet, but you have to remember they are not necessarily representative of the hundreds of thousands of other users.

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                        RobbieTTR M 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 3
                        • RobbieTTR
                          RobbieTT @jimp
                          last edited by

                          @jimp said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                          ISC is EOL and people should consider switching. The features needed for the bulk of users are there and work and many if not most users could switch and barely notice a difference in behavior.

                          Thanks Jim and a 'note' in the GUI that reflected the above quote is close to ideal. To avoid startling any non-technical folk you could soften it further by stating that "ISC remains fully supported but is nearing EOL and...".

                          I can testify that it is indeed remarkably easy and painless to switch between the two; something I commented positively on during the dev stage.

                          โ˜•๏ธ

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                          • M
                            michmoor LAYER 8 Rebel Alliance @jimp
                            last edited by

                            @jimp said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                            The users who post on the forum/social media in general tend to be more advanced and sure they may want/need some features that aren't there yet, but you have to remember they are not necessarily representative of the hundreds of thousands of other users.

                            This is a fair point.
                            Follow up - Do we need to wait for 24.03 to get the feature complete Kea or can it be delivered in an update prior?

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                            jimpJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • jimpJ
                              jimp Rebel Alliance Developer Netgate @michmoor
                              last edited by

                              @michmoor said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                              Follow up - Do we need to wait for 24.03 to get the feature complete Kea or can it be delivered in an update prior?

                              Most likely it will take enough time to implement that it will be close to the release before it's ready anyhow, but if it's ready before then, we are considering different methods of distribution (e.g. as a system patches update if possible). Though it will likely require additional binaries/daemons to manage the DNS API integration which would limit the viable methods. But we're keeping our options open for the moment.

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                              • JonathanLeeJ
                                JonathanLee @maverickws
                                last edited by JonathanLee

                                @maverickws said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                                DHCP option 26.
                                Also . . .

                                Option 252 WPAD
                                Option 42 NTP
                                Option 3 Gateway
                                Option 6 DNS

                                Make sure to upvote

                                M 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                                • M
                                  mcury @JonathanLee
                                  last edited by

                                  @JonathanLee said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                                  @maverickws said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                                  DHCP option 26.
                                  Also . . .

                                  Option 252 WPAD
                                  Option 42 NTP
                                  Option 3 Gateway
                                  Option 6 DNS

                                  I only use DHCP 43, I use it to adopt Unifi switch Mini to Unifi controller, but since it is already adopted, I don't need it anymore, so I'm already testing KEA and so far, so good..

                                  dead on arrival, nowhere to be found.

                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                                  • maverickwsM
                                    maverickws
                                    last edited by

                                    I guess we'll end up realising that there are more users using "advanced" options that initially thought.

                                    RobbieTTR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                                    • RobbieTTR
                                      RobbieTT @maverickws
                                      last edited by

                                      Option 6 was the first one I noticed. Missing Option 42 was ok as everything I currently have points to an internal IP address.

                                      โ˜•๏ธ

                                      JonathanLeeJ maverickwsM 3 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                      • JonathanLeeJ
                                        JonathanLee @RobbieTT
                                        last edited by

                                        @RobbieTT do you also use 252 for wpad?

                                        Make sure to upvote

                                        RobbieTTR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • maverickwsM
                                          maverickws @RobbieTT
                                          last edited by

                                          @RobbieTT have to ask, why manually adding option 6 instead of using the section under DHCP Server:
                                          Server Options > DNS Servers ?

                                          I actually only use this when using high availability in order to put the VIP address there, but works fine tho.

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                                          • RobbieTTR
                                            RobbieTT @JonathanLee
                                            last edited by

                                            @JonathanLee said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                                            @RobbieTT do you also use 252 for wpad?

                                            Not currently, at least not on my home network. I don't think I have anything looking for wpad.

                                            @maverickws said in KEA DHCP - lacking features:

                                            @RobbieTT have to ask, why manually adding option 6 instead of using the section under DHCP Server:
                                            Server Options > DNS Servers ?

                                            I'm not sure I understand you?

                                            โ˜•๏ธ

                                            maverickwsM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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