Patent ID: 7463607

Claim:
An apparatus, comprising: an access point (AP) capable of allocating and communicating IP address information during wireless communication by said AP pre-caching a predetermined number of IP addresses from a backend Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server; at least one additional AP, wherein said at least one additional AP uses the following flow for pre-caching IP address information at said at least one additional AP; said at least one additional AP pre-caches a limited number of IP address from a network DHCP server with said at least one additional AP thereby performing DHCP messaging with DHCP server to procure IP addresses before a potential wireless device roams to said at least one additional AP; when a mobile wireless device performs Re-Association Request, Resource Query, or Resource Reservation with said at least one additional AP, then said at least one additional AP will indicate new IP address parameters to said mobile wireless device; once said wireless device decides to roam to an AP, it already has the new IP address, and can perform additional higher layer functionality necessary for roaming; and said at least one additional AP removes this IP address from its list of pre-cached IP addresses, and can query DHCP server to get some more IP addresses.