Correct local domain and host-name DD-WRT setup

For a long time, I've struggled with inconsistent results for name queries on my local network. For example, sometimes OS X (El Capitan) couldn't ping a host by name while dig (host, nslookup) worked fine.

Also, I had never really tried to understand several options in the DD-WRT setup for domain and host names and the way they affected dnsmasq's configuration, the default DHCP and DNS server on DD-WRT.

My situation is that of a typical home user with a DHCP-assigned IPv4 address and no public host name or top-level domain.

As it turned out, I had got the setup wrong: the »hostname« and »domain name« on the main setup page refer to DHCP options sent to the ISP by the router's DHCP client, udhcpc. My ISP doesn't require any of those, so the fields should be left blank on my setup.

Instead, the right place to set the router's host name is the aptly-named »Router name« field.

The correct place to define the top-level domain of the local network is the »domain name« field in the »DHCP Server« section on the »Services« tab. In addition, »Used domain« must be set to »LAN and WLAN« instead of »WAN« because we don't actually have a »WAN« domain.

By the way, I chose »lan« as the name of my local domain because »local« has been specified for use by mDNS.

As a result, the router's host name is correctly entered into /etc/hosts (both with and without my local domain) and dnsmasq resolves names of local DHCP clients both in their short and long forms.

Use all USB3 ports of Intel DH87RL on El Capitan

Today I succeeded in enabling all of my Intel DH87RL motherboard's USB3 ports.

As it turns out, El Capitan's XHCI driver has a limit of 15 ports which was taken up by the board's USB2 ports, leaving just one USB3 port usable.

Since only 8 USB2 ports are actually physically accessible from the outside, disabling the unused ports makes more USB3 ports available.

In theory, this should happen automatically because OS X evaluates the board's DSDT which should flag the user-accessible ports. Needless to say, the DH87RL's DSDT is buggy, so this method fails. ioreg is a helpful tool to find out the current configuration.

Helpfully, Apple has implemented a port disabling feature to handle the case of buggy DSDTs. Examples can be seen by examining the existing plug-ins of the XHCI drivers, to be found at /System/Library/Extensions/IOUSBHostFamily.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleUSBXHCIPCI.kext/Contents/Info.plist. This file contains port specifications for each different computer model.

In order to create my own port specification for my DH87RL, I used the fact that the XHCI controller uses a label of 'XHC1' on Apple's DSDT's, while the DH87RL's XHCI is labelled 'XHC' by the DSDT. This allowed me to create my own kext by matching on the emulated model name 'iMac14,2' in combination with 'XHC'.

By trial and error I found out that the USB2 ports provided by the DH87RL are numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9 and A. I created a file /EFI/CLOVER/OEM/DH87RL/kexts/10.11/InjectUSB.kext/Contents/Info.plist with the following contents:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
 <key>CFBundleDevelopmentRegion</key>
 <string>English</string>
 <key>CFBundleGetInfoString</key>
 <string>1.0.1, Copyright © 2000-2014 Joki Inc. All Rights Reserved.</string>
 <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key>
 <string>org.joki.injector.usb.USBXHCIDH87RL</string>
 <key>CFBundleInfoDictionaryVersion</key>
 <string>6.0</string>
 <key>CFBundleName</key>
 <string>XHC1 injector for DH87RL</string>
 <key>CFBundlePackageType</key>
 <string>KEXT</string>
 <key>CFBundleShortVersionString</key>
 <string>1.0.1</string>
 <key>CFBundleSignature</key>
 <string>????</string>
 <key>CFBundleVersion</key>
 <string>1.0.1</string>
 <key>IOKitPersonalities</key>
 <dict>
  <key>iMac14,2-XHC1</key>
  <dict>
   <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key>
   <string>com.apple.driver.AppleUSBMergeNub</string>
   <key>IOClass</key>
   <string>AppleUSBMergeNub</string>
   <key>IONameMatch</key>
   <string>XHC</string>
   <key>IOProviderClass</key>
   <string>AppleUSBXHCIPCI</string>
   <key>IOProviderMergeProperties</key>
   <dict>
    <key>port-count</key>
    <data>FQAAAA==</data>
    <key>ports</key>
    <dict>
     <key>HS01</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>AQAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS02</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>AgAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS03</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>AwAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS04</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>BAAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS06</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>BgAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS08</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>CAAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS09</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>CQAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>HS0A</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>CgAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP1</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>EAAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP2</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>EQAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP3</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>EgAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP4</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>EwAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP5</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>FAAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
     <key>SSP6</key>
     <dict>
      <key>UsbConnector</key>
      <integer>3</integer>
      <key>port</key>
      <data>FQAAAA==</data>
     </dict>
    </dict>
   </dict>
   <key>model</key>
   <string>iMac14,2</string>
  </dict>
 </dict>
 <key>OSBundleRequired</key>
 <string>Root</string>
</dict>
</plist>

After reboot, I could use all of my USB3 ports (for reference, numbered 9, A, B, C, D and E).

A handy command to see the kernel boot messages is

$ log show --debug --last boot --style compact