On Mon, 11 Oct 2004 16:44:38 -0500 Jonathan Hutchins [email protected] wrote:
On Monday 11 October 2004 11:45 am, Frank Wiles wrote:
What I'm saying is that while Bittorrent is by definition P2P, the others you listed are not.
How do you define P2P? It means Peer to peer, implies transferring files from one system to a similarly used system, usually Personal Computer to Personal Computer. All of the methods we've discussed here can be used for that.
Peer to peer is a type of file transfer network where each node ( aka peer ) has equivalent capabilities and responsibilities. In a P2P network a client can retrieve a file from a central location ( i.e. Bittorrent when only a single seed exists ) or from another client.
This differs from a client-server model in that the software used to be a "server" is vastly different from that of a "client". Much like scp is different from sshd, ncftp is different from ProFTPD, a web browser is different from a web server, etc.
The other big difference is the distribution of the data is done in the "client" space and not on the server side with mirrors, network attached storage, etc. It is also automatic distribution where a new "mirror" doesn't need to be registered with the server admin to start sharing the load.
I have no idea why I'm still taking the time to talk about this...
--------------------------------- Frank Wiles [email protected] http://www.wiles.org ---------------------------------