[vox-tech] disabling dhcp at startup

[Charles McLaughlin]

Hi,

I'm new to debian, so bare with me. ;-)

My laptop currently gets an IP address via dhcp while the system starts
up.  This can be annoying if I am not connected to an ethernet cable,
because it stops the entire boot process until I press ctrl+c.

How can I disable the system from getting an IP address at startup?  I'd
rather just run dhclient manually once the system is up and running.

Better yet, it would be nice to have the system get an IP address at
startup but detect if the cable is not connected.  I stole that idea from
red hat 8.

Thanks!
Charles