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Mathematical Analysis of Gnutella

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the it-warrants-mentioning dept.

jrp2 sent in a paper written by one of Napster's founding engineers. It is a mathematical evaluation of Gnutella discussing why the network won't be able to scale up to any reasonable size. I have been impressed with Gnutella in the past, and have wondered along these same lines in the past.

6 of 332 comments (clear)

  1. This is old news. by BitterOak · · Score: 3, Offtopic
    This has been discussed since shortly after Gnutella came out. It is essentially arguing that if each peer asks several other peers if a song is available, you get an exponential growth of search requests and the network clogs if you have too many users. This was basically the rationale for the Fasttrack type of systems, such as Morpheus, which most people use today.

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  2. mathamatical evaluation by Molina+the+Bofh · · Score: 2, Offtopic

    It is a mathamatical evaluation of Gnutella

    Someone has not passed his grammatical evaluations at school :)

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  3. Re:Hitchhiker's Guide, Part II. by Phexro · · Score: 4, Offtopic

    Earth: Mostly harmless.

    you must have the new edition.

  4. OT: Quick! Earn that Karma! by Cheshire+Cat · · Score: 3, Offtopic

    Since numerous people above have pointed out this is a repeat, everyone should browse the older article and repost all the comments that were modded up to +5, and reap the benefits when that karma comes rollin' in! ;)

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  5. Scaling is not the issue by Black+Art · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Quality of files is the problem.

    There are a number of problems using Gnutella.
    Getting a complete and/or undamaged file is difficult. (Especially anything long.)

    Just because you find a file does not meanyou can get it. Huge numbers of the files "available" on Gnutella are either on non-routable addresses or on servers that refuse connection or timeout.

    Many of the files on Gnutella are misnamed or misattributed. Do a search on "Weird Al", for example. You will get all sorts of responses, few of them actually by Weird Al.

    It is useless for getting files that contain multiple parts, unless tared or the like. (For example, getting a complete album is next to impossible. The unreliability of the service ensures that.)

    Gnutella seems to have nothing to insure any sort of "quality of service" or file intergrity.

    Pretty much a waste of time.

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    "Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
  6. Re:Hitchhiker's Guide, Part II. by sharkey · · Score: 3, Offtopic

    Maybe "partially lethal" would be more appropriate.

    That's just the pretzels.

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