excessive overhead.
We want to apply for a socket number within the range of 1-63 (Inside
Macintosh: Networking states these are reserved for use by Apple) so that
there is no chance that Apple or another developer could create a product that
tries to use the same socket. If we can obtain an assigned socket number, all
future applications that we create will use the same socket number.
A We understand your need for a well-known, static DDP socket number, since your
application multicasts/broadcasts to a well-known number. Unfortunately,
however, Apple does not assign static socket numbers.
Your best bet would be to pick an arbitrary number (in whatever range you feel safest) and use it, but allow the user (or the network administrator) to modify that number via a control panel (possibly an administrative panel that uses a preference file that the administrator distributes, or an administrative server that provides this number).
While this method doesn't guarantee that you'll have sole use of a socket
number, it does allows you to have some centrally administered options.