On Thu, Dec 12, 2002 at 09:16:33AM +0100, Urban Boquist wrote:
> >>>>> Richard Rauch writes:
> 
> Richard> That's kind of what I figured.  But then, why tell ...253 to
> Richard> tell itself?
> 
> Unless I misremember this is what is called "gratuitous ARP", an
> interface arps for itself simply to announce to the world "here I am,
> now at this (possibly changed) mac address". It will give listeners a
> chance to update their arp tables.

Yes, and it's also used to detect duplicate IPs.

--
Manuel Bouyer, LIP6, Universite Paris VI.           Manuel.Bouyer@lip6.fr
     NetBSD: 23 ans d'experience feront toujours la difference
--