Yosemite DHCP Server does not die !

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Yosemite DHCP Server does not die !

I run a small office where the MacOSX (Yosemite) server does mail, dns, etc. but not DHCP - the addresses are handed and managed by the router, a very good and sophisticated one (Miktrotik).

It all worked fine until at some point my partner by mistake enabled the DHCP service on the OS X Server. Shortly he disabled it again (turned it off in the admin application). However even though it shows to be "off" and "disabled", the **** thing keeps answering DHCP requests and giving out addresses.

Checking the logs I can clearly see bootpd is answering requests - so I killed it. The server resucitated it and kept answering requests.

I've tried restarting, turning the service on and off again, everything to no avail.

How could I disable it for good?

Posted on Mar 16, 2015 2:26 PM

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Answer 1

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John Lockwood

Level 6

13,685 points

Mar 17, 2015 3:13 AM in response to rmichelena

You could briefly enable it, then edit the DHCP settings to disable the network interface it is listening on and save that setting, then delete the zone and again save it, and then disable it again. It should then have no settings to give out even if still running.

I presume you have tried rebooting the server?

You could also try the following in Terminal.app

sudo /bin/launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/bootps.plist

You could also check that the /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/bootps.plist file contains a value for the Disabled key of true, i.e. yes it is disabled.

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Answer 2

rmichelena Author

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Mar 17, 2015 12:41 PM in response to John Lockwood

That worked, thanks...! it still does listen for the DHCP requests and logs them, but now at least it does not answer them. Good.

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Answer 3

May 4, 2015 2:21 PM in response to John Lockwood

Hello John,

I have encountered a very similar issue.

If I unload or disable bootps.plist (sudo /bin/launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/bootps.plist)

Will that affect the ability to use netboot/netinstall?

Or is the bootps.plist only for DHCP?

Thank you!

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Answer 4

Jul 29, 2016 2:39 AM in response to rmichelena

I know that this is an old post but I had the same issue and what fixed my problem was disabling internet connection sharing. I had enabled internet connection sharing at one point a long time ago to temporarily provide internet access for a special situation.

I recommend that you check System Preferences > Sharing and see if internet sharing is enabled.

A good indicator is if the IP addresses that you see in the clients tab or that the client computers are receiving are of the 192.168.2.x variety.

Hope this helps someone out there.

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