If I open a browser and send a request to http://255.255.255.255, is it possible have a web server, on the same subnet, listening and respond?
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A:
HTTP servers use the TCP protocol, and broadcast packets can only be sent through the stateless UDP protocol.
Quoting W. Richard Stevens from his classic book TCP/IP Illustrated (Chapter 12):
Broadcasting and multicasting only apply to UDP, where it makes sense for an application to send a single message to multiple recipients. TCP is a connection-oriented protocol that implies a connection between two hosts (specified by IP addresses) and one process on each host (specified by port numbers).
So, I guess the answer is no.
Daniel Vassallo
2010-08-26 21:27:01
Cool, thanks. I've done discovery via UDP Multicast, but wasn't sure if TCP was possible over broadcast, thanks again.
necrobious
2010-08-26 22:21:19