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This is an attempt to try to explain what BitTorrent is, and why the latest
version of Plucker, 1.4, is being distributed in this format as well as the
other formats. Pardon the roughness of this, I came up with it on the fly.
This is in response to some emails I have received asking about BitTorrent
with regard to the Plucker downloads with this latest release of Plucker.
Please read it fully, there are many important items covered here.
~ What IS BitTorrent used for?
----------------------------
BitTorrent is a protocol designed for transferring files. It is
peer-to-peer in nature, as users connect to each other directly to send
and receive portions of the file. BitTorrent operates around the
principle of a central server (called a tracker) which managed the action
of all of the peers. The tracker only manages connections, it doesn't
know anything about the contents of the files being distributed, and
therefore a large number of users can be supported with relatively
limited tracker bandwidth.
The key philosophy of BitTorrent is that users should upload (transmit
outbound, i.e. "send") at the same time they are downloading (receiving
inbound, i.e. "receive".) In this way, network bandwidth is used as
efficiently as possible. BitTorrent is designed to work even better as
the number of people downloading a certain file increases, in contrast to
other file transfer protocols such as ftp or http.
It's important to remember that BitTorrent is not a "file downloader", it
is a peer-to-peer (p2p) protocol implementation, which gains its
advantage when there are more peers on the network. When you close
BitTorrent after downloading your version of the file, you restrict
others from being able to use take advantage of it.
~ Why not just use HTTP for Plucker releases?
-------------------------------------------
Actually, we do. The problem occurs when a large number of people request
the same file, at the same time, and the physical amount of bandwidth is
saturated with incoming http requests. This is precisely what happened
with the 1.4 release of Plucker on Monday (7/28). The release went up on
the servers, and was mirrored across the Plucker "collective" (a
collection of servers all operating as one "consciousness" for the
Plucker website), and so many people requested downloads over the next 48
hours (and still counting) that the servers could no longer provide
speedy downloads to many people.
The result is that those who wished to download the files at 200k/sec.
and faster, were now forced to get them at 1-2k/sec. because there were
so many concurrent requests clogging the pipes. Tuning the webserver
didn't help, because the sheer number of incoming HTTP requests were
clogging the outgoing downloader's ability to maintain a fast download
speed.
The more people that request a file from the servers over HTTP, with a
finite amount of bandwidth, the slower each person downloading the files
will be. This is where BitTorrent derives its strength. The more people
request a popular file with BitTorrent from the Plucker servers, the
better the speed and chances other people who want that same file will
be. Bandwidth _increases_ when more people request downloads using
BitTorrent.
~ Where can I find out more about BitTorrent?
-------------------------------------------
The BitTorrent homepage and project sites are a good start. Here are some
urls to get you started:
http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/
http://btfaq.com/
~ I was told that "Peer-to-Peer" (p2p) was illegal. Is it?
--------------------------------------------------------
No, and in fact, nothing could be farther from the truth. Peer-to-peer is
very much legal, and encouraged, because it reduces the burdon on one
site, or server, or provider from having to bear the weight of all of the
traffic for projects or other files served from that location. In fact,
many Linux distribution manufacturers are now looking strongly at
BitTorrent as a means of distributing their ISO images, to ease the
burdon on their own file distribution servers.
Sharing files is not illegal, and in fact, it's what the Internet in
general is all about. The "illegal" part begins where the contents of
those files contains copyrighted information, for which you may not have
the right to redistribute, without permission.
Sharing the latest copy of a DVD movie you bought in the store using
BitTorrent, is most-certainly a copyright violation, but sharing the
latest release of Plucker, is not.
~ What happens after my download completes?
-----------------------------------------
After your download of the file you want over BitTorrent completes, you
now become a "node" or a "peer" on the tracker's list of available
clients to send other requesters to. You can now send parts of the file
you have already downloaded, to other people who may not have those parts
yet.
Once you have downloaded the file you want, DO NOT CLOSE BitTorrent!
Doing so restricts the ability of other users to benefit from the speed
and parts of the file you have downloaded.
Peer-to-peer only works when there are peers on the network sharing parts
of the files. If you close your BitTorrent client, other users can't
download the file as fast, or in as many parts, because there are less
peers on the network carrying that file, and by closing your BitTorrent
session, you have removed even more parts of the file from distribution.
So please, when you use BitTorrent, help others by keeping your
BitTorrent client open, even if it is for only a few hours longer.
~ When can I download the normal files again?
-------------------------------------------
Once the volume of downloaders slows down a bit, the normal files will be
made available again as direct links. We could not predict that Plucker
1.4 would be this popular, but apparently it has been. The files are
still there, but are available through BitTorrent as the primary means of
download, with the other files being secondary, until the number of
downloaders consuming the available bandwidth calms down a bit.
If you need the files right now, use BitTorrent. If you don't need them
right away, wait a few days for everything to (hopefully) go back to
normal, and try your download again with the normal links.
~ END.
If you have any other questions, comments, concerns, or other issues with
the server, downloads, or anything else related to Plucker, downloading
Plucker, using Plucker, or otherwise, please do not hesitate to ask.
d.
perldoc -qa.j | perl -lpe '($_)=m("(.*)")'
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