Hi, I've been working on Metalink which is used by OpenOffice.org at http://distribution.openoffice.org/p2p/magnet.html
Metalinks collect information about files in an XML format used by programs that download. The information includes mirror lists, ways to retrieve the file on P2P networks, checksums for verifying and correcting downloads, operating system, language, and other details. With a list of multiple ways to download a file, programs can switch to another server if one goes down. Or a file can be downloaded from many mirrors at once, usually making the download go much faster. Downloads can be repaired during transfer for guaranteed downloads with no errors. Geographically closer mirrors can be used before others further away. Downloads can be filtered by a file's operating system or language. They can also be used to add multiple files to a transfer queue. All this makes things automatic which are usually not possible or at least difficult, and increases efficiency, availability, and reliability over regular download links. About 15 programs support Metalink on Mac, Unix, and Windows. openSUSE ( http://en.opensuse.org/Released_Version#Metalink ), Arch Linux, and other distributions use it for ISO downloads. There is a patch for Bouncer, which handles OOo downloads, but it has not been integrated upstream yet. Someone is also in the process of adding support to DownThemAll, a Firefox extension. More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metalink http://www.linux.com/article.pl?sid=06/11/01/1641247 http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/using_metalinks http://www.osresources.com/3_18_en.html If anyone would like to join in and offer suggestions or offer help coding for current projects or work on new ones, please let me know. -- (( Anthony Bryan )) Metalink [ http://www.metalinker.org ] --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
