padding before end of DHCPOFFER packet?

[Ted Lemon]

On Sep 4, 2014, at 2:12 PM, Joseph Bernard <jhb at clemson.edu> wrote:
> Is it valid to have padding (0) before the end (255) of a DHCPOFFER packet?  I have a Cisco switch doing this, but I’m not sure if it valid.  I have some old HP Jetdirect boxes that will not take a packet constructed like this.  I just want to be sure if the padding is valid or not so I don’t mistakingly accuse Cisco of having bad code.

Pad options are just options, and are allowed anywhere in the payload, but required nowhere.   Old versions of JetDirect are notoriously bad.   So you might want to mention it to Cisco if they are supporting you, but otherwise there's no point--it's not a protocol violation.