I have my NetBSD machine setup as a firewall on my cable modem.  The
outside NIC gets its IP address via DHCP.  The thing I find strange is
that when the cable modem does not give the machine an IP address on
bootup, the machine does not get the correct hostname.  I set the
hostname in the rc.conf file.  Why?  Is this normal?  If not, how do I
fix it?

The other issue has to do with requiring the IP address.  If the machine
does not get its IP address on bootup or it loses it once it is running,
the machine will not get the IP address once the cable modem is
functioning again.  Is this normal?  If not, how do I fix it?

Sam