Dhcp same subnet different vlans

dhcpipsubnetvlan

I want to setup my work's network so that all wireless clients get assigned a certain IP range but are on the same subnet as the other network devices. Currently I'm running dnsmasq for DHCP and DNS on a server that is NOT the wireless AP, but is in fact two switches away.

So let's say the entire network is on 10.0.0.0/16 but I wan't to assign the wireless clients the 10.0.10.10 – 10.0.10.200 specifically.

What's the best way to accomplish this? VLANs all the way to the dnsmasq server, then routing between the same subnet? Buy a more featureful wireless bridge with more dhcp options?

Thanks.

Best Answer

My suggestion - turn your question around and ask how it is that your DHCP server can differentiate a request from a wireless vs a wired client? Your server needs some kind of cue to do its job correctly.

The usual (and easiest) mechanism is to set the DHCP server to allocate addresses based on where the request was either sourced- or sent (i.e. the separate subnet you don't want to use). In some cases if there's an active DHCP relay then something like a subscriber-id field can be included in the request. You can always set up static reservations for all of your wireless clients (yuck) or you might be able to key off of a common set of vendor prefixes in the MAC address.

The bottom line, however, is that these are all hacks (at best) and that the right answer is to deploy your DHCP based on best practice (...which is using different subnets).

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