DHCP overview

The Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) provides a framework to assign configuration information to network devices.

Figure 9 shows a typical DHCP application scenario where the DHCP clients and the DHCP server reside on the same subnet. The DHCP clients can also obtain configuration parameters from a DHCP server on another subnet through a DHCP relay agent. For more information about the DHCP relay agent, see "Configuring the DHCP relay agent."