> From: Gaetano Mendola [mailto:mendola@bigfoot.com]
>
> I think I have to discard also the addresses with last octet
> equal to 256.
>
> Any comments ?
>
Any octet that contains a number less than 0 or greater than 255 should be
suspect.
Assuming you really meant 255:
It would be perfectly legal for an entity on the internet to have a block of
addresses with a subnet mask of less than 24 bits, which leads to legal
addresses that end in 255.
For example, if your company/university/black helicopter squad needed about
500 servers with direct presence, you might be assigned a block like
123.45.6.0/23. So the network address would be 123.45.6.0, the broadcast
address would be 123.45.7.255, and everything in between, including
123.45.6.255 and 123.45.7.0, would be available for your servers.
HTH,
Paul