ARP(4) BSD Kernel Interfaces Manual ARP(4)NAMEarp — Address Resolution Protocol
SYNOPSIS
device ether
DESCRIPTION
The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) is used to dynamically map between
Protocol Addresses (such as IP addresses) and Local Network Addresses
(such as Ethernet addresses). This implementation maps IP addresses to
Ethernet, ARCnet, or Token Ring addresses. It is used by all the Ether‐
net interface drivers.
ARP caches Internet-Ethernet address mappings. When an interface
requests a mapping for an address not in the cache, ARP queues the mes‐
sage which requires the mapping and broadcasts a message on the associ‐
ated network requesting the address mapping. If a response is provided,
the new mapping is cached and any pending message is transmitted. ARP
will queue at most one packet while waiting for a response to a mapping
request; only the most recently ``transmitted'' packet is kept. If the
target host does not respond after several requests, the host is consid‐
ered to be down allowing an error to be returned to transmission
attempts. Further demand for this mapping causes ARP request retransmis‐
sions, that are ratelimited to one packet per second. The error is
EHOSTDOWN for a non-responding destination host, and EHOSTUNREACH for a
non-responding router.
The ARP cache is stored in the system routing table as dynamically-cre‐
ated host routes. The route to a directly-attached Ethernet network is
installed as a “cloning” route (one with the RTF_CLONING flag set), caus‐
ing routes to individual hosts on that network to be created on demand.
These routes time out periodically (normally 20 minutes after validated;
entries are not validated when not in use).
ARP entries may be added, deleted or changed with the arp(8) utility.
Manually-added entries may be temporary or permanent, and may be
“published”, in which case the system will respond to ARP requests for
that host as if it were the target of the request.
In the past, ARP was used to negotiate the use of a trailer encapsula‐
tion. This is no longer supported.
ARP watches passively for hosts impersonating the local host (i.e., a
host which responds to an ARP mapping request for the local host's
address).
Proxy ARP is a feature whereby the local host will respond to requests
for addresses other than itself, with its own address. Normally, proxy
ARP in FreeBSD is set up on a host-by-host basis using the arp(8) util‐
ity, by adding an entry for each host inside a given subnet for which
proxying of ARP requests is desired. However, the “proxy all” feature
causes the local host to act as a proxy for all hosts reachable through
some other network interface, different from the one the request came in
from. It may be enabled by setting the sysctl(8) MIB variable
net.link.ether.inet.proxyall to 1.
MIB Variables
The ARP protocol implements a number of configrable variables in
net.link.ether.inet branch of the sysctl(3) MIB.
max_age How long an ARP entry is held in the cache until it needs
to be refreshed.
maxtries Number of retransmits before host is considered down and
error is returned.
useloopback If an ARP entry is added for local address, force the traf‐
fic to go through the loopback interface.
proxyall Enables ARP proxying for all hosts on net.
DIAGNOSTICS
arp: %x:%x:%x:%x:%x:%x is using my IP address %d.%d.%d.%d! ARP has dis‐
covered another host on the local network which responds to mapping
requests for its own Internet address with a different Ethernet address,
generally indicating that two hosts are attempting to use the same Inter‐
net address.
arp: link address is broadcast for IP address %d.%d.%d.%d! ARP requested
information for a host, and received an answer indicating that the host's
ethernet address is the ethernet broadcast address. This indicates a
misconfigured or broken device.
arp: %d.%d.%d.%d moved from %x:%x:%x:%x:%x:%x to %x:%x:%x:%x:%x:%x on %s
ARP had a cached value for the ethernet address of the referenced host,
but received a reply indicating that the host is at a new address. This
can happen normally when host hardware addresses change, or when a mobile
node arrives or leaves the local subnet. It can also indicate a problem
with proxy ARP. This message can only be issued if the sysctl
net.link.ether.inet.log_arp_movements is set to 1, which is the system's
default behaviour.
arpresolve: can't allocate llinfo for %d.%d.%d.%d The route for the ref‐
erenced host points to a device upon which ARP is required, but ARP was
unable to allocate a routing table entry in which to store the host's MAC
address. This usually points to a misconfigured routing table. It can
also occur if the kernel cannot allocate memory.
arp: %d.%d.%d.%d is on if0 but got reply from %x:%x:%x:%x:%x:%x on if1
Physical connections exist to the same logical IP network on both if0 and
if1. It can also occur if an entry already exists in the ARP cache for
the IP address above, and the cable has been disconnected from if0, then
reconnected to if1. This message can only be issued if the sysctl
net.link.ether.inet.log_arp_wrong_iface is set to 1, which is the sys‐
tem's default behaviour.
arp: %x:%x:%x:%x:%x:%x attempts to modify permanent entry for %d.%d.%d.%d
on %s ARP has received an ARP reply that attempts to overwrite a perma‐
nent entry in the local ARP table. This error will only be logged if the
sysctl net.link.ether.inet.log_arp_permanent_modify is set to 1, which is
the system's default behaviour.
SEE ALSOinet(4), route(4), arp(8), ifconfig(8), route(8), sysctl(8)
Plummer, D., "RFC826", An Ethernet Address Resolution Protocol.
Leffler, S.J. and Karels, M.J., "RFC893", Trailer Encapsulations.
BSD March 28, 2007 BSD