number; for (human) display it is subdivided into four 8 bit chunks
> (called "octets" for obvious reasons), and those octets only can
> go from 0 to 255 (since 2^8 == 255).
>
Nit, but 2^8 is 256.
In binary the first address is 0 which is all bits off. In a /24 network the .0 is reserved for network addresses and 255 is reserved for broadcast which means there are 254 usable host addresses!
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