KEACTRL(8)

💅 KEACTRL(8) — like, the keactrl manual page, bestie ✨

okay so this is keactrl from section 8 of the manual, and it ships with Kea, and honestly? she's the stage manager of the whole Kea friend group 🎀

🌸 NAME 🌸

keactrl — a shell script for managing Kea. that's it, that's the vibe. she's a shell script and she runs the whole operation 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

keactrl [command] [-c keactrl-config-file] [-s server[,server,...]] [-v]

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

keactrl is a shell script that runs the whole startup / shutdown / reconfiguration situation for the Kea servers — we're talking kea-dhcp4, kea-dhcp6, kea-dhcp-ddns, kea-ctrl-agent, and kea-netconf. 👑

she also lowkey lets you check the current status of the servers and figure out which configuration files are actually in use. very "i know what's going on at all times" of her.

🎀 CONFIGURATION FILE 🎀

depends on what you need, bestie — you do not have to run all the available servers. the keactrl configuration file says which servers are enabled and which are disabled. by default, that configuration file lives at [kea-install-dir]/etc/kea/keactrl.conf. 📁

for the actual documentation of the parameters in the keactrl configuration file, go read the Kea Administrator Reference Manual — she's got the lore.

💖 OPTIONS 💖

• command — the actual command you're issuing to the servers. she can be one of these:
  • start — starts the servers. 🚀
  • stop — stops the servers. 🛑
  • reload — tells the servers to re-read the Kea configuration file. heads up tho: the NETCONF agent does not support this command. 🫶
  • status — prints the status of the servers. 📊
• -c|--ctrl-config keactrl-config-file — picks the keactrl configuration file. without this switch, keactrl just uses [kea-install-dir]/etc/kea/keactrl.conf.
• -s|--server server[,server,...] — specifies a subset of the enabled servers to which the command should be issued. separate the list of servers with commas, and no spaces in between, okay? no intervening spaces, she's serious. acceptable values are:
  • dhcp4 — DHCPv4 server (kea-dhcp4).
  • dhcp6 — DHCPv6 server (kea-dhcp6).
  • dhcp_ddns — DHCP DDNS server (kea-dhcp-ddns).
  • ctrl_agent — Control Agent (kea-ctrl-agent).
  • netconf — NETCONF agent (kea-netconf).
  • all — all servers, including NETCONF if it was configured to be built. this one is the default, iykyk.
• -v|--version — displays the Kea version. ⭐
• -V — displays the extended Kea version. (yes she has two, and yes they're different, don't @ me)

🌈 DOCUMENTATION 🌈

Kea comes with an extensive Kea Administrator Reference Manual that covers literally every aspect of running the Kea software — compilation, installation, configuration, configuration examples, and so much more. she ate. 💅

Kea also has a Kea Messages Manual, which lists every possible message Kea can print, each with a brief description. both documents are available in various formats (.txt, .html, .pdf) with the Kea distribution. the Kea documentation lives at ‐ https://kea.readthedocs.io. 🔗

the Kea source code is documented in the Kea Developer's Guide, available at https://reports.kea.isc.org/dev_guide/.

and the Kea project website is at https://kea.isc.org. go say hi 🫶

💌 MAILING LISTS AND SUPPORT 💌

there are two public mailing lists available for the Kea project, and they're both giving community:

• kea-users (kea-users at lists.isc.org) — for Kea users.
• kea-dev (kea-dev at lists.isc.org) — for Kea developers, prospective contributors, and other advanced users.

both lists are available at https://lists.isc.org. the community provides best-effort support on both of those lists — best-effort, so like, be nice and be patient 💜

ISC also provides professional support for Kea services. see ‐ https://www.isc.org/kea/ for the details. 💼

🔥 SEE ALSO 🔥

kea-dhcp4(8), kea-dhcp6(8), kea-dhcp-ddns(8), kea-ctrl-agent(8), kea-admin(8), kea-netconf(8), perfdhcp(8), kea-lfc(8), Kea Administrator Reference Manual.

like, the whole squad, fr fr 👑

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Internet Systems Consortium

🍓 COPYRIGHT 🍓

2019-2025, Internet Systems Consortium

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k that's the whole page, no cap 💖 this was Kea version 3.0.3, dated Mar 26, 2026, and the manual page answers to KEACTRL(8) — mwah, go configure something iconic 🧚✨