In Ethernet environments, the Layer 2 multicast process is seamlessly supported. A 48-bit multicast address is utilized and the stations listen for the address at Layer 2. These addresses are used for various purposes beyond traditional multicast implementations, for example, Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) and Layer 2 protocol tunneling techniques.
When multicast applications are created, developers must be aware that there is some overlap in the addressing when mapping IPv4 to MAC addresses. The IPv4 multicast group range is 224.0.0.0 to 239.255.255.255 (a total of 228 groups) and the MAC address range allocated . . .
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