kea

Author: mrccie

Copyright: 2025, mrccie

Date: 31-MAR-2025

Version: 1.0

PURPOSE

This package is designed to enable automatic deployment of a kea dhcp server system in a home/prosumer network. DHCP is important but should only be at the forefront of your thoughts if you want it to be.

System Requirements

This solution has been tested on the following hardware:

• Platform: VM (4x vCPU, 4GB RAM, 24GB Disk) [moving to RPi after initial testing]
• OS: Ubuntu 24.04

Note:

• Resource utilization is nearly non-existent for a small network
• The installation notes below should not be used. They pertain generally to a Raspberry Pi and will be updated as testing proceeds

Raspberry Pi Initialization

If you're installing on a Pi from scratch, you'll need to do a few things first.

Steps to set up a headless RPi

(Optional but Strongly Recommended Step) Set a Static IP - HEADLESS SETUP (if a GUI is in use, set it in Network Manager)

Run the following command to list the available network interfaces:

ip address

You'll see output like the below. In this example, eth0 is the interface name (yours may be different).

2: eth0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether d8:3a:dd:89:ee:4c brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.2.118/24 brd 192.168.2.255 scope global dynamic noprefixroute eth0
       valid_lft 50497sec preferred_lft 50497sec
    inet6 fe80::e5ed:478a:a19e:548/64 scope link noprefixroute
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever

Edit or create a new file in /etc/systemd/network/ for the interface:

sudo vim /etc/systemd/network/10-static.network

Add the following configuration (updated for your system):

[Match]
Name=eth0

[Network]
Address=192.168.2.7/24
Gateway=192.168.2.1
DNS=4.2.2.4 8.8.8.8

Run the following commands to enabe systemd-networkd and apply the changes:

sudo systemctl restart systemd-networkd
sudo systemctl enable systemd-networkd

Verify the new IP configuration with:

ip address

(If You're Running a GUI-based distro as Headless...) Disable NetwokManager or it will interfere with DNS

sudo systemctl stop NetworkManager
sudo systemctl disable NetworkManager

sudo rm /etc/resolv.conf

Set up DNS manually:

echo "nameserver 4.2.2.4" | sudo tee /etc/resolv.conf
echo "nameserver 8.8.8.8" | sudo tee -a /etc/resolv.conf

Make sure the file can't be overwritten by marking it immutable:

sudo chattr +i /etc/resolv.conf

Restart Networking

sudo systemctl restart systemd-networkd

Validate DNS is operational:

ping -c 3 google.com

(Optional) Disable WiFi (assuming a Raspberry Pi with an ethernet connection)

Edit the following file:

sudo vim /boot/firmware/config.txt

Add to it:

dtoverlay=disable-wifi

Restar the system:

sudo shutdown -r now

Change the password of the user 'pi' if you haven't done so already:

passwd

Update the operating system:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

Set your local timezone:

sudo raspi-config
> 5 - Localization Options
>> L2 - Change Time Zone
>>> Pick accordingly
>>>> Finish

Installation: Pre-Requisites and Git

This is just on Git for now.

Pre-requisites:

• Raspberry Pi has internet connectivity
• Terminal access to the Pi (local or via SSH)
• RECOMMENDED: Configure the Pi with a static IP for web reachability

Install git:

sudo apt-get install -y git

(Optional) Configure git:

git config --global user.email "<email>"
git config --global user.name "<username>"

Make a directory to clone this repository to:

mkdir git
cd git

Installation

Clone this repository:

git clone https://github.com/mrccie/kea

Go into the repository directory:

cd kea

Use the install script:

sudo ./install.sh

Known Issues

If you are installing this on a Raspberry Pi rather than an x86 platform, the location of the hook libraries is different than what is in the configuration file. Solve for this by running:

find /usr/lib -name "libdhcp_lease_cmds.so"

Then go to the ~/kea_tools/server_config file and update the path for the libdhcp_lease_cmds.so and libdhcp_stat_cmds.so files to the directory you found. This will likely mean updating the path to /usr/lib/aarch64-linux-gnu/kea/hooks/.

What to Do Next?

There are a few tools built into ~/kea_tools. Navigate there and check them out. If they don't do enough for you, Google is your friend!

Note: If you want to accept this scripts default API username and password, you can simply edit the "view_leases.sh" file to remove the "info" section, as the defaults are already loaded.