Comment 1 for bug 526386

From a brief look at the code, it appears that the relevant section is in src/dnsmasq.c : 169-189. In this mode, if unable to access an interface because it doesn't exist, dnsmasq should poll the interface for a configurable timeout to see if it becomes available before quitting. As there may be multiple interfaces, implementing this as a push-to-back-of-queue delay until there is only one interface polling will ensure that the majority of intentionally specified interfaces come up as quickly as if all interfaces existed.