[ECOS] Why does sending multicast UDP require a gateway?

[Grant Edwards]

Somebody I work with has spent the last three days trying to send UDP
multicast packets using eCos and the FreeBSD network stack.

After quite a bit of trial-and-error we've discovered that you can't
send UDP multicast packets without configuring a valid gateway
address.

That seems broken to me.

What are you supposed to do if you're on a strictly local network that
doesn't _have_ a gateway?  [That is the case for many of our products.]

UDP multicast (by definition) won't use the gateway, so why require
that one is configured?

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! It's some people
                                  at               inside the wall!  This is
                              gmail.com            better than mopping!


-- 
Before posting, please read the FAQ: http://ecos.sourceware.org/fom/ecos
and search the list archive: http://ecos.sourceware.org/ml/ecos-discuss