The value that’s printed will not change unless relevant network interfaces are either added to or removed from the system.

ifcount - Prints the number of interfaces that IPConfiguration is capable of configuring.

The output will be empty if no service is currently configured or active on the interface.

getifaddr interface-name - Prints to standard output the IP address for the first network service associated with the given interface.

This is only useful for initial system start-up time synchronization for legacy network services that are incapable of dealing with dynamic network configuration changes.

waitall - Blocks until all network services have completed configuring, or have timed out in the process of configuring.

It’s abilities are broken down into these subcommands: The ipconfig utility is a very powerful command. In all cases, the IPConfiguration agent performs IP address conflict detection before assigning an IP address to an interface. The agent implements the client side of the DHCPv6 protocol (RFC 3315) and supports both stateless and stateful operation. The IPConfiguration agent also enables and controls the IPv6 SLAAC (RFC 4862) state in the kernel, and also handles statically configured IPv6 addresses. It may also allocate and assign a link-local IP address if DHCP fails to acquire an IP address. It also assigns and maintains static IP addresses. The IPConfiguration agent implements the client side of the DHCP and BOOTP protocols described in RFC951, RFC1542, RFC2131, and RFC2132. The IPConfiguration agent is a program bundle that is loaded and executed by the configd(8) process. The IPConfiguration agent is responsible for configuring and managing the IPv4 and IPv6 addresses on direct, connectionless interfaces such as ethernet and Wi-Fi. The System Managers manual also helps with defining what the IPConfiguration agent is: The ipconfig command first appeared in Mac OS X Version 10.0 Public Beta. Using it for any other purpose is strongly discouraged.

It should only be used in a test and debug context. Ipconfig is a utility that communicates with the IPConfiguration agent to retrieve and set IP configuration parameters.

Note that if you are looking for more direct control over network interfaces, such as configuring static IP addresses, consider using the ifconfig utiliy.Īccording to the System Manager’s Manual: It can also be used to display the IP address, subnet mask, and router address of the current connection. This command can be used to configure the network interface settings of an Ethernet or Wi-Fi connection. The ipconfig command-line utility in MacOS helps users administer and control the Bootstrap Protocol and DHCP client from the comand line. A Guide to ipconfig on Mac What is ipconfig

Ip config on mac