[OT]: Multicasting

[Trever L. Adams]

I know this is off topic.  I am not sure where else to go.  All of my
google searches lead me to very dead and very old information on
multicasting.  I am sure most of it is not useful, though some of the
basics are.

If people have a problem answering on list, please answer off.

My questions:

What protocols and session management (besides IGMP) does the kernel
support (say, does it support source specific multicasting?)?

Are the old how tos on multicast programming still the only things I
need to worry about?

If there are only X groups (in the few thousand if IRC), does the
protocl allow only forwarding Y port on X group to the end person, or do
they get the entire group?

Anyone know of good books for Linux/Unix multicast programming?

Trever Adams

P.S. I am sure I have left out 1 million and 1 valuable questions that I
need/want answers to, please feel free to add in what you think might be
good for me to know.

P.P.S. Sorry if this got here twice, I didn't see a copy returned to me 
last week through the list.