P2P Services Speak Out Against Gnutella2

An anonymous reader writes "Three leading Gnultella services voice their opinions on Gnutella2 or Mike's Protocol as they refer to it as. None of the three recognize Gnutella2 as true Gnutella and worry its propritary protocol will divide the Gnutella community. In the first interview Vincent Falco of BearShare contributes his thoughts. The second interview gets input from Greg Blidson of LimeWire, and Arno Steenbekkers from XoloX."

Comments

Since Napster is dead....

[Economist]

... P2P is already divided in too many protocols and such.

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Anonymous Coward]

Peer to peer search clients in general just suck. The only decent way to do it was Napster's central directory structure. Otherwise the protocol overhead traffic itself wastes huge amounts of bandwidth. Since all we're interested in is legitimate non-pirated music and software, why not just setup a new Napster? Then if people try to put pirated content on it, kick them off.

Or have a moderator system that approves the posting of content and then signs an md5 signature with their gpg key or something. The only ones that are out of luck with that kind of system are the actual pirates. Who cares about them?

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Coke in a Can]

"Since all we're interested in is legitimate non-pirated music and software, why n-"

Whoawhoawhoawhoa, who said we're not interested in piracy?

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Goldberg's Pants]

None of the three recognize Gnutella2 as true Gnutella

Jesus... GROW UP! Way to speak like politicians...

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[samhalliday]

Peer to peer search clients in general just suck.

I agree, anytime i search for anything these days, all gnutella comes up with are about 100 files out there all called exactly what i want, but containing some kind of advertisment in surprise. Yeah, i can block that persons IP and stuff... but, there is so much false stuff floating around out there now that its not even worth the effort.

I hear figures which say P2P and napster kill off the music indutry, but in my own personal experience, i have seen quite the opposite: pushed by hearing new music for the first time in a long while, my father bought the only cds he has bought since they came out last year, and many of his friends also. i have also been on ICQ and asked friends, on the other side of the world "you hear so-and-so yet?" yeah, search on napster... and within days they have ordered the CD (which may or may not be sold locally in their country.).

i dunno where all these figures have come from, nobody prefers to listen to music through crappy computer speakers, they buy CDs to go in decent stereo systems when it is good enough...

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Anonymous Coward]

Diversity is a GOOD thing in the climate of M/RIAA.

Expect a defacto standard...

MS p2p SDK

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[larry bagina]

Since all we're interested in is legitimate non-pirated music and software

+5 funny. Or is it -1 Reality Distortion Field?

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Anonymous Coward]

See here http://www.shareaza.com/forum/viewthread.aspx?ID=5 138 for Mike's response.

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[macdaddy357]

Gnutella has been as useless as the tits on a bull from the outset. People who are whining that you shouldn't "fix what ain't broke" don't get it that gnutella is badly broken. Gnutella2 can only be an improvement.

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[petrus4]

Can someone please explain to me why unity is always considered mandatory??

I really don't understand what is supposed to drive genuine innovation if we demand that everyone (as much as possible, anywayz) is under one banner and doing the same thing. Why is having many different P2P protocols a bad thing? I always thought that this kind of diversity meant that, even if eventually there had to be only one, having large numbers initially would better facilitate the selection process.

Read Darwin, people. Genuine technological development does not come about from rigid unity, but rather just the opposite. You have as many different prototypes, re-interpretations, code forks, or versions of whatever it is you're developing as possible. That way the most suitable model/s for the task are identified over time. The relevant salvageable features of the less suitable models can be taken and added to the more suitable ones, and the less suitable ones eventually fall away by themselves...naturally.

This goes back to the entire Linux vs Windows question, where the thing people complain about is the idea of only having one system (Windows) where they can't make any of the decisions concerning the operating system for themselves.
To me it makes a lot more sense if you don't just have Windows OR Linux, but rather that you have Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, the Mac OS, AmigaDOS, and so on, and if they all have their attendant fan/developer base. That way each system has it's particular use or area of strengths, and work continues on developing others for other uses as well. It also means that the user is free to choose what he/she thinks is the best system for the task at hand. Things get done, people are happy, freedom is maintained, and the world keeps turning. ;-)

If you have a singular or monolithic model, this doesn't happen...instead we very often get saddled with frozen, unchanging dinosaurs. Is this really what we want?

Re:Since Napster is dead....

[Anonymous Coward]

[A]nytime i search for anything these days, all gnutella comes up with are about 100 files out there all called exactly what i want, but containing some kind of advertisment in surprise.

Quit browsing for obscure fetish porn, and that problem goes away.

lord...

[ldspartan]

That interview contains more whining than anything I've read recently. Its truly collosal.

Napster.

[jmays]

I just want Napster back.

I thought everyone used Kazaa

[bushboy]

I can't remember the last time I ever considered Gnutella as an operable and useful P2P application.

It was a mission to connect and even more of a problem to actually download useful content !

Unless you were a l33t bandwidth wh0r3, it remains to this day, a useless p2p application.

Kazaa on the other hand actually works !
On a low bandwidth pipe, you can still obtain large files, even if it takes you a week to do it.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Cheesy Fool]

Kazaa only works on Windows.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

That comes as a surprise to me. I have been using Bearshare for a couple of years now with nothing but success. It has improved tremendously over the years. Maybe you should try it again before putting it down.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

You obviously haven't used Gnuttella for several years, you moron. It has a larger variety of files and more bandwidth available than Kazza unless you're looking for the latest manufactured girl band pop excrement, which probably explains why you're such a fan of Kazza.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

Try Shareaza. No, really. I've had zero connection problems and the multi-sourcing works great.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[0x0d0a]

I can't remember the last time I ever considered Gnutella as an operable and useful P2P application.

Try gtk-gnutella out of CVS. Gnutella these days is a very, very different beast from what it once was (thanks to lots of work on the part of the GDF), and its performance is *far* better than it once was.

The reason Kazaa doesn't work for everyone is because it's the last remaining closed P2P protocol. Linux folks can't clone it (and it's extremely difficult to reverse engineer the authentication stuff) because of that, so Kazaa isn't available for Linux.

I've found that Napster for music, eDonkey for large files works pretty well.

I wish more people used oggs, though...

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

What's wrong with eDonkey/eMule?

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[moonbender]

It really sucks for single MP3s. Albums, okay, but single songs, terrible.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Cheesy Fool]

Did you even read the article?

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

Thoroughly. Did you even read the parent comment?

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[OverlordQ]

Dont use Kazza use Kazaa Lite, Kazaa sans-spyware.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[NineNine]

Kazaa only works on Windows

And your point is? Kazaa still has many, many many times more content of all types than any P2P network to date. Gnutella is about as relevant as so many OSS projects: it's not.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[elmegil]

only if you count 5 billion copies of Britney as "many many times more".

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Jsprat23]

Hear, hear. GTK-gnutella is absolutely wonderful. I can get stuff faster than I can burn it. :-p

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[freestyle-fiend]

Direct Connect has many times more content than Kazaa, but that doesn't mean that it's right for everyone. In much the same way, Gnutella might be more useful to some people despite having less content.

Personally though, I find that none of the protocols can be truely useful until it is possible to search them all at once (or if people all chose to you the same one). Where p2p really comes into its own is finding stuff that I can't get elsewhere (if I really want something that is in the shops, I can buy it). If I have to try OpenNap, Gnutella, Fast Track, Direct Connect, IRC, Usenet, etc. every time I want a rare recording, then I don't get very much.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Shade, The]

Um, I'd say his point is that Kazaa only works on Windows. If a person does not use Windows, then they can't use Kazaa, and therefore it's not a choice for some people. How difficult is this to understand? Therefore some people are doubtless interested in Gnutella. Especially since it's gotten quite a bit better, recently.

Gtk-gnutella works quite nicely, I've found. Downloaded all of Trigun and half of Hack Sign from there so far. I even managed to find some Maaya Sakamoto MP3s. Not that I downloaded them, for that would be illegal and bad. *Ahem*. Anyway, the only Anime I couldn't find reliably was Outlaw Star, so I grabbed that from IRC.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

> Personally though, I find that none of the protocols
> can be truely useful until it is possible to search
> them all at once (or if people all chose to you the
> same one).

Sounds to me like you want giFT. It aims to have a single frontend that supports multiple protocols.

At the moment it only supports OpenFT (variation of the Fast Track protocol used by KaZaA).

Considering there's usually only about 450 people connected there's a large amount of content (about 4TB), and since it's only really easy to build on Linux at the moment most of the files are encoded by people who actually know what they are doing (large amount of high quality Ogg Vobis files for instance).

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[peter_gzowski]

I've found that Napster for music, eDonkey for large files works pretty well.

I assume you mean KaZaA for music...

Just a few comments on your comment. KaZaA (Lite) works in Linux under Wine. The KaZaA Lite site even links to instructions on how to get it working. The fact that KaZaA is a closed protocol is not the reason it doesn't work for everyone. No one program is going to work for everyone. KaZaA works for most people I know, from the indie rock fans, to the hip-hop fans, to the jazz fans.

eDonkey is good for large files, albeit slow. I've been using BitTorrent for a lot of my large files (the latest buffy and anime fansubs) lately, although I don't know if this counts as P2P.

I took your advice and grabbed gtk-gnutella (there was a recent release, so I didn't see the need to get the CVS). I'll have to use it some more, but it seems like the same old beast to me. Will give it some more time, though.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

So install Windows, dumbass. You can get it off Kazaa.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Dylan Zimmerman]

Actually, KaZaA lite still has the distributed computing project, the spyware, and any number of other nasty bits of code last time I heard. My understanding is that they just replaced one of the DLLs that was used mostly for advertising with a dummy DLL. That in no way reduces the amount of spyware in the KaZaA executable itself.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[NineNine]

P2P really needs to have a critical mass of users to be useful. That's why I say things like Gnutella are relatively useless. There's not a critical mass of users that makes it easy (or fast) enough to find what I want. Sure, Fast Track may have 5,000,000 copies of a Britney Spears recording, but I've also had great luck finding what I like. I've got a nice little collection of WW2 era big band singers going now. And, there are enough different kinds of FastTrack users now that it's not all one kind of music, either. I'm also steadily working on my 1980's music videos collection with Fast Track, and so far, I've been able to find everything that I've wanted.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[John W. Lindh]

Just a few comments on your comment. KaZaA (Lite) works in Linux under Wine.

People who seriously claim that have never used Kazaa under WINE. Gnutella may have its problems but Kazaa on WINE is just ugly.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, many people use Limewire. Portable and stable; available on any platform JDK1.3 is (which means at least Linux, Windows and MacOS).

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[einer]

Um, I'd say his point is that Kazaa only works on Windows. If a person does not use Windows, then they can't use Kazaa, and therefore it's not a choice for some people. How difficult is this to understand?

Kazaa Lite runs under wine.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[esanbock]

But he's too l33t to install Windows! Actually this stupid fucker probably only runs Windows, but won't admit it on /. because he's too l33t.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

Windoze probably has >>80% of the market share escpecially for those who are sharing files, who cares if you are running Linux.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Microlith]

That's nice.

Now go buy Trigun, .hack, and Outlaw Star and COMPENSATE THE CREATORS.

Or are you just another damned leech?

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Arty]

The reason Kazaa doesn't work for everyone is because it's the last remaining closed P2P protocol.

There's one more left: WPNP (WinMX).
2.x has been disassembled, and a plugin for Lopster has been written.
But no one could use it more than a few weeks: Frontcode changed the WinMX auth routine in 3.x, which hasn't been disassembled until now.

There's even a sourceforge project (LinMX), which, of coure, hasn't released anything until now. Maybe some of the slashdot readers out there have the skills to help it out...

WinMX also doesn't run in WINE. For me personally, on the other hand, it doesn't matter, the OpenNap networks have far more TB out there than anything proprietary.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish more people used oggs, though...

Normally, I can find someone who is sharing FLAC's or OGG's of something on Gnutella by letting the search keep running (and repeating every 10-20 minutes automatically). If you sort the list by the host type, and look for *nix Gnutella clients' strings, there's a good chance you'll find the person in that group. That said, I don't always find OGG's though, I guess, I agree with you :).

For what it's worth, my entire music collection is shared in OGG form and I get a lot of uploads (in my opinion, at least).

Sorry, I'm not posting my IP address :P.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't remember the last time I ever considered Gnutella as an operable and useful P2P application.

Hence, "Gnutella2", which actually makes the damned thing work well. Granted, I don't use P2P much, but when I do I don't like to waste time.

Even as a plain Gnutella client, Shareaza is much better than any other I've tried.

(I refuse to use Kazaa because I don't want to support the use of spyware.)

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[evilviper]

I agree with you... I had been using other Gnutella clones for some time, and they quickly began to return less and less results, and far fewer downloads ever completed. I installed the CVS version of GTK-Gnutella and it Gnutella was rejuvenated. With all the bandwidth controls and compressed connections, I can keep the upstream bandwidth usage down without lossing any functionality. It also allows me to keep it on longer, since I don't need to exit just to give some more bandwidth to other apps.

Swarming et al do a good job of finishing more downloads, and speeding up the process most of the time as well. I'm a convert. I was astonished by the improvements that have happened since I last used it.

My only objection would be how it wastes so much screen space with borders and the like.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[wasteve]

I don't have wine working at the moment but I had WinMX working in Wine about a month ago. It was fairly stable and I could leave it up for a couple of days before it crashed. I suspect that is just as good as what I'd get running it under windows.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[peter_gzowski]

I use KaZaA Lite under Wine, and it's not pretty, but it does the job. Gnutella has its problems AND it's ugly. Maybe it's just I don't like the GTK look of gtk-gnutella. Maybe if somebody made me a kde-gnutella...

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Rares Marian]

You mean Qt-tella and such is available i think.

Gtk = default dev lib for GNOME
Qt = default dev lib for KDE

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Shade, The]

How would you suggest I go about buying .hack? It isn't availiable yet outside Japan. Outlaw Star has been shown on Cartoon Network, and Trigun will be shown on Cartoon Network, since they now have the broadcasting rights. Since I'm subscribed to that channel, and will be for some time, I've already compensated the creators in question through my subscription fees.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Shade, The]

I have an version of Windows 98 on my machine, but I really can't see the point in using it. As hard as it might be for you to understand, some people actually prefer using Linux over Windows for more than idealogical reasons. I use Linux because I like it more than Windows. For me, Linux is better. In fact, whenever I boot back up into Windows, it always annoys me how limited the GUI actually is. Whilst I could use Kazaa, that would mean rebooting and languishing in Windows for several hours, which is a bigger hassle than I really want to go through.

Of course, I realise that from your tone you're either a troll or a moron, so I doubt this reply will make any difference to you either way.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[esanbock]

I was just trolling... don't take it personally.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

You got a *nix based kazaa client, named 'kza' just go on google and search for it.

Re:I thought everyone used Kazaa

[Shade, The]

You're not meant to admit it! :)

How does one "block" hostile clients?

[McCart42]

I would think that it would be fairly trivial to get past any blocks of a certain P2P agent (with an upgrade of the software, that is)...is there some information about the protocol that makes each client unique, and constantly so; i.e., upgrades to the software cannot change this identifying bit of the protocol for the client?

Re:How does one "block" hostile clients?

[rampant mac]

" How does one "block" hostile clients?"

Cock-blocking?

I see your P2P is as big as mine!

Re:How does one "block" hostile clients?

[1nv4d3r]

Any client can lie in the next upgrade, so a good option is usually to block based on behavior. In other words, no matter what client you claim to be, if you send me more than x requests/second for longer than y minutes, you're disconnected.

The other benefit of rules like this is that you don't discriminate one bad client; you discriminate against actions that hurt the network. As long as it plays nice any client is fine.

Re:How does one "block" hostile clients?

[John W. Lindh]

There is NO possibility of reliably blocking hostile clients. You look out for a pattern in their user-agent, messages, anything - they can change it easily. You try to count the queries they are sending, - they simply drop connections often or even claim that some else originated a query and they are merely passing it on. This has been discussed often and lengthy but you simply cannot protect an open network against malicious clients.

Re:How does one "block" hostile clients?

[Rares Marian]

not perfectly, but yes you can protect the network. Crimes happen but we still hire more cops on the street.

Re:How does one "block" hostile clients?

[John W. Lindh]

There is no way you can detect some of those hostilities except by the increased overall query traffic. A node can not keep track of the number of connetion to the network another node keeps. That's simply impossible. You can say you won't allow more than X queries in N minuetes but a hostile client would simply disconnect after sending those X queries and you wouldn't know if it is really a hostile client or if the connection just failed...

This guy is a developer?

[Anonymous Coward]

From the GDF:

"......You could have just left it alone...but unfortunately you decided to have yourself added to the...
[flames=on]
RETARD LIST! YOU F#$@ING IMBECILE! I DONT EVEN NEED TO ARGUE ON THE MERITS WITH YOU, BECAUSE YOU ARE THE **ONLY** JACKASS WHO OFFERRED TO IMPLEMENT G2 BEFORE THE SPECS WERE RELEASED! GUESS WHAT DUDE! YOUR CLIENT SUCKS A BIG FAT DONKEY'S DICK! NO WONDER MORPHEUS DUMPED IT LIKE THE STEAMING HALF COILED TURD THAT IT IS!
[flames=off]......."

This guy is a developer? That's pathetic, this looks like something a ten year old posted.

If you are wondering what client he is speaking of, he is talking about Gnucleus.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[vadim_t]

I don't see why he can't be a developer.

I mean, it's not like the ability to write code somehow grants you any other skills, like social intelligence.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[John W. Lindh]

It's nothing I haven't already seen among developers. It seems to be quite common on certain - ahem - open source devel mailing lists.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[grumpygrodyguy]

This guy is a developer? That's pathetic, this looks like something a ten year old posted.

Maybe he's a ten year old developer.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[smd4985]

I'm just shedding some light on the situation since I interact with the author of those posts. His actions may seem childish, but given the terrible form of the MP people I can't blame him from losing it. When you see your hard work stolen by a bunch of two-bit criminals (the Shareaza folks) - people you have TRIED to reach out to and compromise with, only to be lied to repeatedly - you can get a little hot under the collar.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[Anenga]

No, they are childish and unwarrented. There aren't any excuses for that behavior.

If the GDF would of acted mature in reaction to Gnutella2 when it was first proposed to the GDF, then this would of never of happened. Gnutella2 would of replaced Gnutella1 and remained "Gnutella". Or at least the GDF could of discussed G2 in a technical context, which did not happen.

No "hard work" was stolen. Shareaza did not use GUESS in any way to create G2, so I hope that's not what your implying. Sure, G2 uses some things discussed within the GDF. But anybody can suggest concepts, but it's not as easy when you go and try to code it in.

Look at GUESS. How long was that discussed? Now that's dropped for "Outdegree", something Gnutella2 came up with.

The GDF needs to let their death-grip of the Gnutella throne go and accept Mike as a legitimate contributer trying to help.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, I'm going to have to say thats the chance you take. You put the source and the information out there, you made it available. It's naive to think someone isn't going to pick that up and use it the way they want to. There's no reason to get all childish and bitch and whine at each other. Take that energy/time and use it to do something productive..

Re:This guy is a developer?

[Visceral Monkey]

This guy acts like an ass all the time apparently. If you consider that he's trying to make money with his software you soon realize he's cheesed because this other guy came in and scooped him and the other sleeping beauties on several features. Where they came from really isn't important, they fact he did it in record time without co-towing to them is what set him off more than anything else. More power to those who innovate and actually get something done rather than talking about it forever. If the other guys can out innovate/feature this guy's client then I'd support them; it's all about the best working client. So slap a tampon between your legs, stop crying like a woman and get busy guys.

Re:This guy is a developer?

[cpeterso]

hmm, sounds like an average day on the Linux Kernel list.. ;-)

He said, she said

[christurkel]

While there seems to genuine issues here, I get the impression that neither side is being entirely forthcoming on this situation.

Re:He said, she said

[Anonymous Coward]

What a totally useless non-post. You posted way too soon to actually have read anything and you really don't express any opinion. You just threw out some canned response and hoped for karma.

Then again you have a mac.com homepage. I guess that explains everything.

Re:He said, she said

[christurkel]

I read 700 wpm. I can pretty fast, you might say.

Spellcheck

[arvindn]

Three leading Gnultella services voice their opinions on Gnutella2 or Mike's Protocol as they refer to it as. None of the three recognize Gnutella2 as true Gnutella and worry its propritary protocol will divide the Gnutella community.

Dozens of disgusted slashdotters voice their anger at /. editors or lazy-morons-who-can't-spellcheck as they refer to them as. None of the irate posters recognize /. stories as true English and worry its brain-damagedness will make the subscribers a laughing stock.

Re:Spellcheck

[Dave2 Wickham]

You missed "Gnultella" ;).

Re:Spellcheck

[Anonymous Coward]

Dozens of disgusted slashdotters voice their anger at /. editors or lazy-morons-who-can't-spellcheck as they refer to them as.

The rule of Marc: anyone who posts on Slashdot criticizing another's grammer or spelling is doomed to make one such mistake in his or her own post.

-Marc

Re:Spellcheck

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah, and before you do, there is no need to reply saying I didn't "get it." Think about it for a second.

Re:Spellcheck

[p24t]

remember, stuff in italics is quoted from the submitter.

Re:Spellcheck

[srirams]

its taco. what more can you expect from him other than dupes.

Re:Spellcheck

[Anonymous Coward]

Now it's getting recursive, the correct spelling is grammar.

Ironic...

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it just me, or is it ironic how much they complain about the RIAA on their tales, and when they have something wrong, they start complaining about that?

Re:Ironic...

[Anonymous Coward]

What the hell are you talking about? Is everybody who posts on a Sunday a moron?

unfortunately...

[rebelcool]

kazaa cannot locate 90% of the rare music i look for.

If you want popular or semi-popular things, kazaa works well. For rare things, you might, if lucky, find one person somewhere who has it and it almost always returns 'Needs more sources'.

Re:unfortunately...

[crazyprogrammer]

For rare things, you might, if lucky, find one person somewhere who has it


I looked up rare on m-w.com, here's the thrid definition.
---
rare
3 : seldom occurring or found
---

If you are looking for a rare file, you will probably only find one or two people who have it regardless of what p2p software you use.

Re:unfortunately...

[CainX]

There is a p2p app where you can find only good music. J5 will turn up more files than Nsync. However, it's a small community and we'd like to keep it that way. I'll just say if you care enough it's not impossible to find a music message board that will tell you what it is. I'd appreciate if no one posted it here.

Re:unfortunately...

[Anonymous Coward]

soulseek

Re:unfortunately...

[CainX]

Very nice, I apologize for making the fatal error of assuming the world was devoid of assholes.

Re:unfortunately...

[Grahf666]

The issue at hand is the p2p network's ability to find the one or two people on the entire network that have the file you want (and as an added bonus, to find those people and their files even if they are offline, and to queue the download until they come online... eDonkey and its variants do this afaik). As I understand it, a GnutellaNet client requires progressively more bandwidth (a very expensive resource) to search a larger portion of the network. KaZaA, with it's more centralized design, can search the entire network easily with far less of a bandwidth cost (correct me if I'm wrong in some way on this differentiation). This searchability/bandwidth consumed ratio seems to be pretty important to the usefulness of a p2p client, and is one of the reasons why I think Gnutella kinda sucks.

Easy solution...

[Anonymous Coward]

Just update the protocol the way everyone who isn't Mike sees fit and call it Gnutella 3. ^_^

I thought everyone used Windows...

[Anonymous Coward]

...and therein lies your problem.

Vinnie is a pathetic troll

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's what happened today on the Gnutella Developers Forum

Vinnie says Shareaza is damaging the Gnutella network. Well, his own words are blackening the public's view of ALL Gnutella developers. He himself should be banned from Gnutella, period.

Consider this: most people do not visit the GDF group. So when Vinnie makes an ass out of himself, most people just see his words, and assume that he represents all the other Gnutella developers. People see Vinnie flaming, spewing insults left and right. What are people supposed to think?

Vinne, it\'s alright to make points such as "Shareaza is flooding the network with requests." But when you say things such as "YOU ARE A F#$@ING MORON YOU GODDAMNED SON OF A WHORE," you have gone way past the line.

"I've tried being civil"
If such behavior is what you define as civil...

"I suggest other developers "
Wait, Vinnie, you make it sound like you represent the WHOLE Gnutella community. However, this statement makes it sound like there hasn't been a complete agreement yet, and that this is more your own personal opinion. Has an official decision been made or not?

"YOUR CLIENT SUCKS A BIG FAT DONKEY'S DICK!"
So this is what Gnutella developers are like? Freely bashing other people's work and insulting them when all they have done is try to improve the network. I guess I'll make sure to avoid Gnutella developers at all costs, they sound nasty. Or maybe it's just Vinnie.

Last question: why have I not negatively responded to Adam Fisk? Because he has been civil. You have not.

Re:Vinnie is a pathetic troll

[Anonymous Coward]

What, does Vinnie have an account on here with mod points? This is the second valid comment about behavior that has been modded down. I don't even want to use a product that has someone like that behind it.

Re:Vinnie is a pathetic troll

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to /. You must be new here. The entire moderation system isn't based on the premise that you made an informative, well thought out reasonable comment. It's based on the premise that it's kewl to mod people down as trolls and redundant simply because you disagree with their opinion. The /. mod system should only allow the addition of points for comments which are on topic and for which the arguments are reasonably thought out.

Re:Vinnie is a pathetic troll

[eyeye]

vinnie sounds like Richard Morrell! Although Morrell doesn't quite match this guys creativity.

Re:Vinnie is a pathetic troll

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to *Earth*. You must be new here. The entire moderation system isn't based on the premise that you made an informative, well thought out reasonable comment. It's based on the premise that it's kewl to mod people down as trolls and redundant simply because you disagree with their opinion.

(the rest is just a Wibni)

lost end-user focus

[1nv4d3r]

When did we lose focus on creating the greatest Porn2Pr0n system possible?

These guys should stop bickering and ask themselves every day:
- How can gnutella deliver more pr0n, faster, with more accurate search results?

I know I do, and I don't even develop P2P systems.

Re:lost end-user focus

[Anonymous Coward]

What's your favourite porn that you've found on a p2p network?

Re:lost end-user focus

[Anonymous Coward]

Russian solders getting their heads hacked off by muslims. No, wait...

Re:lost end-user focus

[Anonymous Coward]

When did we lose focus on creating the greatest Porn2Pr0n system possible?

Is this some sort of conversion tool?

Re:lost end-user focus

[Saeger]

Actually, the video clip the AC speaks of is the most disturbing thing I've seen to date, and I've seen a lot of very gruesome things over the years, so it's not easy to shock me.

Search for "unknown russian soldier" if you think you're desensitized enough to witness a soldier rasping for breath after getting his throat cut out then head cut off.

--

Re:lost end-user focus

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm that AC. I know people who work at news tv organisations. People complain about seeing the occasional shocking image on the news. Well, I know people who now suffer depression because of what they`ve had to sit through and edit so we can watch the clean version. They've had to leave their jobs, they have nightmares, and...well, they're fucked. I had to have a look for myself. I've stopped now. Its too much.

I use Windows and Linux

[bushboy]

and sometimes Mac. :)

hehe

Well, I do.

I think Gnome is better than KDE.

I've never tried Debian.

I like RedHat better than Mandrake

I still use windows

I tried Slackware once

I'm not a geek

I think that it's reasonable, though

[0x0d0a]

For a protocol where the peers matter so much, Gnutella works surprisingly well. That's been because the developers worked together very much to keep things going properly and sharing improvements ahead of time to let everyone adapt.

Shareaza broke that.

It doesn't really *matter* as much as these people make it out to be, because almost nobody *uses* the damn client, but it's really stupid that they took the "Gnutella 2" name, which really is deserved by the coalition of developers that shared and worked together.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

I own the Whitehouse.gov because I pay taxes. They stole it from me.

Take youre head from under youre ass jerk.

If they want the name, go register it, they registered gnutella3.com didnt they, they just fucked up.

I am now releasing my own Gnutella4 specs, I can call it anything I bloody want. And you can do fuck all. You whining bitch.

Fucking cry baby lost his lollypop.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[julesh]

For a protocol where the peers matter so much, Gnutella works surprisingly well. That's been because the developers worked together very much to keep things going properly and sharing improvements ahead of time to let everyone adapt.

Shareaza broke that.


That's because the kind of improvements Mike wanted to make couldn't be done with that kind of model. They're things that you just can't know about until you've tried them, and a public beta was probably the only way of making it work. Of course, maybe he should have prioritised the documentation of the protocol over the post-beta releases, but that's just one side of the argument. Others would say users are more important than the other developers.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Istealmymusic]

Quick, someone register Gnutella7.com!

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

> Quick, someone register Gnutella7.com!

wouldn't help, Vinnie will register Gnutella8.com

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Wonko42]

Shareaza broke nothing. Have you used Shareaza? It has an excellent implementation of both Gnutella 0.6 (which every other client uses) and its own Gnutella2 protocol. You can use them both at the same time, meaning that you're a part of both networks. Nothing is being broken. Other Gnutella users get the benefit of your file collection (and vice versa), and other Shareaza users get the same benefit but without the scaling issues (and vice versa).

Of course it was a daft move for Mike to call it Gnutella2, but so what? The guy had written a damn good protocol based on Gnutella, and a rose, by any other name, is still a goddamn rose.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[John W. Lindh]

That's because the kind of improvements Mike wanted to make couldn't be done with that kind of model.

That's simply not true. Mike claimed that on the gnutella developer forum as well but he could not come up with a single feature that could not be implemented as well using the old protocol OR requiring only slight alterations to the existing model.

Others would say users are more important than the other developers.

If Mike were interested in the experience of his users he would go open source and collaborate with other developers to improve his software.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course it was a daft move for Mike to call it Gnutella2, but so what? The guy had written a damn good protocol based on Gnutella, and a rose, by any other name, is still a goddamn rose.

You don't think there's anything wrong with Hijacking the name? Should it be ok for someone to branch Linux sources, change it in some fundamental way and call it Linux2 (assuming Linux wasn't a trademark...)? Or take Mozilla code, twist it to contain spyware, and call that Mozilla2?

As to "damn good protocol", jury is obviously still out. But you are basically claiming end justifies the means... which I consider both ignorant and dangerous attitude.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a user of shareaza (I know nothing about how the gnutella and the gnutella2 networks work on the inside - I stick to programming mozilla) and so far it's better than any other p2p app that I've used. Sure there are a couple crashes but overall it works great. Better than limewire and kazaa from my experience.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Herr_Nightingale]

Gnutella is broken, as anybody comparing FastTrack to (your choice of Gnutella servant here) can attest. It's slow, downloads have a completion rate that is barely usable, and even advances like swarmed downloads don't work very well. Here, try this.. Kazaa Lite is the clean version of Kazaa. Then try this. Limewire is relatively popular, and wholly commercial.
You can post your findings here.

I've tried Shareaza too, and it's faster and has a nicer interface than the other Gnutella servants. It's not, however, on a level with Kazaa yet.
You'll notice that this whole debate over the legitimacy of Gnutella2 (or Mike's Protocol, as Vinnie likes to call it) has two distinct sides: on the one hand, you've got the COMMERCIAL developers, including Vinnie Falco, LimeWire, and Xolox; on the other hand, you've got Mike Stokes and Gnucleus.

What this article fails to mention is that the registration of Gnutella2.com is the real issue at stake. The commercial interests are pissy because they've been one-upped by an upstart, as they see it.

Gnutella 2 is deservedly named, and clearing away the cruft was the only way to improve Gnutella. Mike Stokes clobbered the adware vendors with Shareaza, and did what they were all afraid to do: start fresh, start clean, and start out on a level with the current state of the art P2P applications currently available. I applaud the guy for having such guts. He registered the name, and he deserves to keep it. F*ck the spyware perpetrators.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

The Gnutella name was hijacked from AOL to begin with, so no.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[0x0d0a]

Shareaza broke nothing.

When I said "broke", I was speaking only of the tradition of working together that the Gnutella developers had in the past.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[0x0d0a]

This isn't just a commercial thing -- Raphael wasn't thrilled either, and gtk-gnutella isn't commercial.

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Anonymous Coward]

Quick, you're a fag!

Re:I think that it's reasonable, though

[Istealmymusic]

Man, I'm glad my name isn't Quick right now.

For everyone bashing Gnutella

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, please try Shareaza. It delivers where the other clients have obviously failed. Don't let these competing developers make up your mind for you just because the Shareaza guy isn't a member of their exclusive little group.

Pings & Pongs, and the Gnutella Protocol

[Anonymous Coward]

As everyone here knows, the biggest problem with Gnutella is the sheer amount of bandwidth that each servent uses by just trying to "actively" discover hosts by using pings and pongs--but is this method really necessary? Do you really need to know which individual hosts are out there? I don't think so. From the user's standpoint, the only thing we are concerned with is the content on the network itself, and not the hosts that reside on the network. Kazaa, for example, uses a "passive" method to discover hosts--each peer queries for specific content, and the superpeers respond, replying with ONLY the hosts that have the requested content. Gnutella, in contrast, blindly uses pings and pongs to discover new hosts to which it can query. Kazaa scales to millions of users, and yet, Gnutella, a protocol that also runs on TCP, is burdened with bandwidth problems (despite the GDF's efforts to "cache" each pong). So much time has been spent on various ways to improve the gnutella protocol, and yet, the most obvious solution is left out: get rid of pings and pongs. Stop searching for hosts when you should be searching for files instead. Implement mutual index caching or the UberPeer(or UltraPeer) and stop the ping/pong flooding altogether. That way Gnutella vX.XX can scale to any size, and we can drop Kazaa and have a truly open network.

Occum's Razor: All things being equal, the simplest solution is the best one.

Re:Pings & Pongs, and the Gnutella Protocol

[John W. Lindh]

As everyone here knows, the biggest problem with Gnutella is the sheer amount of bandwidth that each servent uses by just trying to "actively" discover hosts by using pings and pongs--but is this method really necessary?

Gnutella has stopped using Pings/Pongs that excessively almost two years ago. Today most of the bandwidth is used for routing queries and queryhits.

Gnutella is currently scaling infinitely. But it does and will never be able to let one user search the entire network. On Fasttrack or any other decentralized p2p network not a single search will ever reach more than a certain network horizon. The challenge is to increase this searchable horizon as much as possible. Clients sending many, many queries reduce this horizon because the more queries are sent, the sooner they will be flow-controlled. The only solution to this problem is, that every client says: "I'm just going send so many queries that are just as long-lived to find one or two hundred results and then I'm going to stop to free resources for others."

If there are many selfish users/clients searching for as many results as possible you can as well forget the whole open network thing. The most exciting idea behind Gnutella is that everybody can connect to it. This is its greatest strength and its greatest weekness at the same time. We will see if the world is ready for such a network or if it will go down the same road as Socialism ;-)

Re:Pings & Pongs, and the Gnutella Protocol

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont know the G2 spec, nor the G1 one for that matter, but I hear that G2 is supposed to search globally if it gets few enough hits. So I use to search for some random string to probe the size of the G2 network.

Re:Pings & Pongs, and the Gnutella Protocol

[Anonymous Coward]

I like WinMX. I like to queue.

Holy crap.

[Anonymous Coward]

Highlight the hidden flame.

If Shareaza is ECM'ed somehow, I would suggest everyone write clients to return false hits to flawed BearShare clients that point to content stating that Vinnie is acting like a dick.

Hahaha!

[Anonymous Coward]

BearShare 4.2.3 Build SlipStream Candidate b1
[AM] Always reply to Shareaza requests for files with a 503 Busy, without providing any Alt Locs

There you have it folks! BearShare's broken, malfunctioning client signals the beginning of the end of the Gnutella network more than Shareaza does. So just who is the enemy here? I'll give you a clue, it's not Shareaza.

ShareReactor.

[Grendel Drago]

One word.

ShareReactor.

Complete, well-ripped releases. Most of the good stuff is in the forums. Sure, it's slow during peak hours, but that's a small price to pay for knowing that everything will arrive, intact, full quality, checksummed.

Also, eMule is a really nice-looking client.

--grendel drago

Re:ShareReactor.

[Ashran]

One word: Usenet
Nuff said

Re:ShareReactor.

[soupdevil]

eMule is not a bad client, and currently there's a lot of interesting content on the donkey network. But central servers will be the death of any P2P network. FastTrack is already secretly negotiating the terms of their own demise with Hollywood. The donkey network will be next.

Only serverless p2p has a chance to survive long enough to develop enough non-infringing users to withstand the lawsuits. Right now Gnutella, Gnutella 2 and Overnet are our only choices. My money (and my own content) is on G2.

Check out www.leeware.com for non-infringing content available through the G2 network. And check out www.sharelive.com for a G2 site similar to ShareReactor.

Re:ShareReactor.

[Anonymous Coward]

You fucker! You /.'ed SR! A pox on you and your family you insensitive clod!

Oth.net

[Grendel Drago]

For really weird or rare stuff, I check out oth.net. It's a search engine for ratio FTP sites. Some of them are scams. Ignore these. Also good for music videos.

--grendel drago

So have you used it?

[soupdevil]

Mike may be young and naive, and a bit arrogant. But Shareaza is the most robust, feature-filled Gnutella client there is, and he did it all by himself. That's impressive.

FastTrack is proprietary and under attack, the donkey depends on central servers and Gnutella is stagnant. Assuming Mike releases the specs this month (as he's promised), we'll have an open source, server-free, super-scaling, global searching P2P network. We've never had one, and that's exciting.

The fact that Shareaza is free as in beer and free as in of-spyware/addware is just a bonus.

Re:So have you used it?

[koh]

Assuming Mike releases the specs this month (as he's promised), we'll have an open source, server-free, super-scaling, global searching P2P network.

Open-source ?? Should I understand that Mike declared he would open the complete source code of Shareaza as well as the MP specs ?

AFAIK this is not the case. May you be so kind as providing a link ? And mention the licence used ?

Re:So have you used it?

[soupdevil]

I said the network would be open source, not Shareaza.

Mike has said he will release the G2 specs this month.

Is there another free client?

[Jay Maynard]

I use Shareaza because it doesn't bundle any adware, doesn't bundle any spyware, and doesn't do anything but file sharing. BearShare still has adware in it. Are there other clients that don't include the crap and still provide the function? (And no, I haven't touched the timeout settings, nor do I intend to.)

FWIW, BearShare's complaining seems motivated at least in part by the fact that Shareaza is out there potentially taking away its revenues...

Re:Is there another free client?

[sabNetwork]

Exactly, this is what the other P2P applications should imitate. Shareaza took the existing Gnutella network and turned it into something useful. After you use it for five minutes, you'll know what I'm talking about. What originally took hours of searching on Limewire now takes a few minutes with Shareaza/Gnutella2.

Shareaza is not planning on keeping the Gnutella2 protocol a secret. This is simply a marketing tactic; keep it secret long enough to lure new users, then release the spec. Seeing how Shareaza is the only P2P product that isn't making money (no ads, no spyware), I think they are entitled to be a little sneaky.

This being said, I hope that Shareaza releases the Gnutella2 spec in good time. Gnutella2 is the only way that competing P2P networks can compete against KaZaA.

Re:Is there another free client?

[NathanBFH]

I don't know about Xolox or BearShare, but Limewire is open source, and the cvs version does not contain adware. http://www.limewire.org if you are interested. It's not as convienient as just downloading from the website, obviously, but it does get you an ad-free version of the client.

Re:Is there another free client?

[Rares Marian]

What marketting tactic?

If you are concerned about network standing up under the stress, then you can see this is a self-destructive tactic. Keeping it secret means that only a few people can benefit from development. The purpose of a client is to provide a good user interface. The purpose of the technology is to provide good service. In the end you end up with bastardized clients that meet neither goal very well.

If it were open from the beginning, then the day Mike's Protocol chokes on its own enthusiasm, people can fix it or they could throw all that development down the drain to go back to an open fixable system.

Reality has limits. It's not wise to rush to crash into them but to know how to manage them.

Networks are much the same.

Oh dear...

[MP3Chuck]

"None of the three recognize Gnutella2 as true Gnutella and worry its propritary protocol will divide the Gnutella community"

<sarcasm>OMG Wouldn't that make getting illegal music/movies/software more difficult? WTF!!!11 </sarcasm>

That sounds like a good Ask Slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

Comment

what a soap opera!

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with Gnutella and GDF is that it's a true soap opera with a few developers, that do not like each other that much. Well, as long as e.g. Bearshare can take control and distribute it's spyware, all of it's own proprietary extensions or seperation of the Gnutella network were fine. There are so many selfish facts and quotes from GDF developers in the past... I can't take them serious anymore! For example read what "holly" Bearshare developer states:

Vinnie (who owns gnutella3.com) has said that Bearshare will be "moving forward with our own proprietary Gnutella 3 technology". He has also stated that "Our goal is not to block Shareaza from the network, but rather to give their users the worst possible experience so they will stop using the application. I'll leave it up to your imagination as for the methods we will employ". Some reports say that a block may already be in place in the latest version of Bearshare.

From http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=90

Civil war among Gnutella developers is not somthing new!
Every good client hiting Gnutella was usually accused being bad or crap. Once it was Phex, then Xolox, today it's Shareaza. Even well integrated features like 'swarmed downloading' were once rated "bad" from those developers who didn't have it in their own clients - now it's standard in every client. Bearshare has a long tradition of hidden features (not available to other vendors) or in suddenly blocking one competitor. Is there any Gnutella client that wasn't blocked or bitched in the past? I doubt that.

It's a long history of bitching against each other... not efficient work but indeed amusing. New ideas on the GDF looks more like "eat it or die" than a detailed and productive discussion. Other ideas are optimized for marketing instead for technology... Limewire decided to call it's superpeer concept "Ultrapeer" to make it look better than other P2P systems (even though it wasn't even reliabale - is it today or does it need more patches called GUESS2, GUESS3 HYPERMEGAGUESS?).

Of course there are exception! I'd like to name two: For exmaple one open source developer, John from Gnucleus, has written lines and lines of free code. Continously implementing new features while at the same time avoiding (the worst) GDF fights. For example, the Gnutella protocol documentation at http://rfc-gnutella.sourceforge.net/ mainly from Tor Klingberg & Raphael Manfredi - which was started long after the big ones had there userbase already (no papers prolly to keep new developers away and to increase greedy spyware businees plans? *asking*). I hope those guys and also Shareaza keep their motivation to innovate and help the Gnutella community. For those who believe the latest Bearwire hype (Bearwire = Bearshare + Limewire business alliance), I suggest speak with some other developers.... log on to irc.p2pchat.net ... AFAIK some Gnutella clients run a home channel there and you can meet develoepers as well.

I recomend to read the GDF archives and please poste some of the most funniest quote. Let's make a Gnutella soap opera best of. :)

Greets, Mark

PS: I wonder why Xolox sneaks to the side of Bearshare and Limewire. strange. well, must be one rules of a true soap opera: suprising changes or dead twin brothers popping up from nowhere.

Re:what a soap opera!

[Anonymous Coward]

BUMP

very good post... the GDF is a joke

Long live gnutella2

Re:what a soap opera!

[grumpygrodyguy]

As long as greed or fame is the fuel for development, there will be no real progress.

It's no coincidence that Linus Torvalds grew up in socialist Finland, and from that upbringing went on to do the work he did.

The U.S. is just not capable of producing people like him.

Re:what a soap opera!

[esanbock]

Comments like that only aid the Linux terrorists.

winamp's justin?

[Anonymous Coward]

what i'd really rather see is what Justin (from Winamp) thinks about the "new" protocol? wasn't he the one that developed the original Gnutella protocol anyway? Which actually goes to show you that even 1 person could come up with a decent protocol...you don't really need a committee.

Trust

[bluelan]

Some guy has developed a closed source, closed protocol P2P client that he wants me to run on my system.

Morpheus
LimeWire
KaZaa
Blipster
NeoNapster
IMesh
Grokster
...

Sure, I'll run his app. I'd loan him my car keys too, if he wanted. I also like to let people hit me with a baseball bat, repetititively. I'm just that type of guy.

1) Lock 'em in
2) Spyware
3) ???
4) Profit

Re:Trust

[julesh]

Actually, he's developed a closed source P2P app and promised to open the specs when he's finished writing them. But everyone's too impatient for that.

1) Lock 'em in
2) Spyware
3) ???
4) Profit

I don't think that's what he had in mind....

Re:Trust

[bluelan]

It's entirely possible that he intends to release his specification publicly, even though he's already missed several self-imposed deadlines for doing so. Until it is released, you'd really have to trust the guy as a friend to trust his client.

This is how MS is going to conquer P2P

[thehunger]

In 6-12 months from now, if anybody asks how Microsoft managed to conquer the P2P marked so fast, simply point them back to this thread to show them the state of quibbling between all the other players.

What they should have done is gang up against Microsoft with open standards and inventive forward thinking and not simply try to use P2P as a scheme to get rich quickly.

Re:This is how MS is going to conquer P2P

[julesh]

Have you actually looked at the MS P2P app? Come on, that conquer anything? You gotta be joking. Its basically MSN messenger for groups with all the bells and whistles. It allows you to push files to people who you've invited to connect to you. I don't see it going very far...

Re:This is how MS is going to conquer P2P

[Anonymous Coward]

There is an API available, go code ur own and stop whining. Bitch.

My Experience

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to use Limewire all the time, but it was written in Java so it was (a) slow and (b) had its own set of menu/window widgets, which made it a pain to use. The only files I ever found were popular music that I didn't need, Futurama episodes (okay - that part was good), and faked porn files that had links to paysites encoded inside.

I switch to Shareaza. It's small. First thing I notice is that the user interface is GREAT. Seriously, you have to be smoking crack to think its user interface is bad. It keeps me informed about my searches, uses the OS' native widgets, is FAST and best of all, I have never seen so many responses to my searches. Whether that is becuase of "Gnutella2" or something else I don't know, and don't care. When you're trying to download movies of Anna Ohura at 3am, you want what works, it's that simple.

And Shareaza doesn't include spyware crap.

-5 wrong subject

[Anonymous Coward]

subject of the article is biased IMHO.

P2P Services Speak Out Against Gnutella2?? I mean, who is speaking out against G2, who is 'P2P services'? I understand the linked interviews as: mainly two known Gnutella vendors ('P2P Services' = Bearshare and Limewire, doh) speak against G2. Of course, they will lose their spyware revenue. Why taking them serious?

Just skip ahead and go to Gnutella3.

[Kjella]

Remember Windows 2.0?
IPv5?
No.
Just go straight ahead and skip it, just make sure you agree on something better :)

Kjella

Re:Just skip ahead and go to Gnutella3.

[kenthorvath]

Remember Windows 2.0?

IPv5?

No, but I remember C+ ... whatever happened to that anyway? Damn c++ comes along and everyone forgets about the good ol' days ;-)

Re:Just skip ahead and go to Gnutella3.

[Anders1]

Remember Windows 2.0?

Yes.

Re:protocol?

[larry bagina]

All we need is the quickest way to swap Libby Hoeler vids... Christ I'm getting hard just thinking about it now

this will get rid of your hard-on!

Don't thank me.

Propietary??!!

[cosmosis]

Perhaps I have not kept up with the latest P2P developments, but its almost impossible to imagine how Gnutella2 could possibly be Propietary. How is this even possible, that a new standard for a P2P protocol of all things, a systems that is decentralized without authority being propietary. Is this some kind of joke or a nightmare?

Re:Propietary??!!

[soupdevil]

G2 is not "propietary" (sic). The initial G2 client, Shareaza, is proprietary, and was created by the creator of the G2 protocol to prove it would work.

Now that he's proven it will work, he's finalizing the G2 specs, which he has said he will release this month, which will make Gnutella2 a completely open protocol.

Anyone ever heard of Gnucleus?

[MrChris007]

I can't believe that when I searched the list of replies to this article there is no mention of Gnucleus. Not only is it open source, but there is not spyware or anoying pop-up ads in the program. I have used quite a few different Gnutella clients and I have found gnucleus to be one of the better. Sadly, they don't have a linux verison, but you can get the source and probably figure out a way to make it work on Linux or you could just run it in on linux using a windows emulator like Wine.

Re:Anyone ever heard of Gnucleus?

[Anonymous Coward]

You would be sad to know that the developer of BearShare (Vincent Falco), who has major control in the GDF, has recently denounced Gnucleus in The GDF:

"ou could have just left it alone...but unfortunately you decided to
have yourself added to the...
[flames=on]
RETARD LIST! YOU FUCKING IMBECILE! I DONT EVEN NEED TO ARGUE ON THE
MERITS WITH YOU, BECAUSE YOU ARE THE **ONLY** JACKASS WHO OFFERRED TO
IMPLEMENT G2 BEFORE THE SPECS WERE RELEASED! GUESS WHAT DUDE! YOUR
CLIENT SUCKS A BIG FAT DONKEY'S DICK! NO WONDER MORPHEUS DUMPED IT
LIKE THE STEAMING HALF COILED TURD THAT IT IS!
[flames=off]"

Re:Anyone ever heard of Gnucleus?

[OuD]

Gnucleus may be good, but so is gtk-gnutella and mutella.

Gtk-gnutella has all the features I need: swarm downloading, blocking of bad (hammering) clients, SHA1, bandwidth throttling, ultrapeer support.. the works. Oh yeah, and an iptables-like filtering system with which one can create fairly complex rules to auto-download/auto-drop certain files selected with regexps etc.. (check for tutorials on the gtk-gnutella site for this one, it takes a bit of getting used to)

Mutella OTOH has no swarm downloading or advanced filtering (I think) but is console based, which has its advantages (think "screen" on remote server).

typical conversation on the GDF

[Anonymous Coward]

Steve Lamb wrote at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/the_gdf/message/1393 0

This is in response to Vinnie's recent announcement that Bearshare will henceforth block Shareaza.[...]
Vinnie, to the best of my knowledge, has been opposed to every single
improvement in Gnutella unless he or his business spearheads it. In short
unless it garners him a better reputation he is opposed to it. Not only is he
opposed to it but he will resort to personal attacks and threats against the
people who are pushing the idea forward. If there was ever a poster child
about why G1 is so stagnant it would be Vinnie's whiny mug.

--------------

Answer from Vinnie at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/the_gdf/message/1393 2
[flames=on]
Hey Steve, why don't you cut a penis-sized hole in a full-length
mirror and GO FUCK YOURSELF!!!! I REALLY DONT GIVE A SHIT WHAT YOU
THINK! ITS DONE! SHAREAZA IS BLOCKED! WE ARE BEYOND RATIONAL
CONVERSATION AT THIS POINT! THERE IS NO COMMUNICATION! CAPISCE?
[flames=off]

--------------

once he blocks himself by accident or b/c nobody else is left

Lies, bloody lies!

[John W. Lindh]

Vinnie (who owns gnutella3.com) has said that Bearshare will be "moving forward with our own proprietary Gnutella 3 technology".

That was more or less an empty threat, as Vinnie admitted later on BearShare. There are no concrete plans from BearShare's side to create a proprietary new protocol.

Even well integrated features like 'swarmed downloading' were once rated "bad" from those developers who didn't have it in their own clients - now it's standard in every client.

It was rated "bad" that Xolox had implemented a proprietary sub-protocol for its swarming without discussing it with the other developers.

Limewire decided to call it's superpeer concept "Ultrapeer" to make it look better than other P2P systems

Not true. Ultrapeers were initially called supernodes. The name was changed because they are working slightly different. Supernodes are indexing the files of the leafs, Ultrapeers aren't.

Of course there are exception! I'd like to name two: For exmaple one open source developer, John from Gnucleus, has written lines and lines of free code.

And so do LimeWire, gtk-gnutella, mutella or Phex. Shareaza however is completely proprietary.

For example, the Gnutella protocol documentation at http://rfc-gnutella.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net] mainly from Tor Klingberg & Raphael Manfredi - which was started long after the big ones had there userbase already (no papers prolly to keep new developers away and to increase greedy spyware businees plans? *asking*).

Crap. The papers have always been available at the GDF yahoogroup and at LimeWire.com. You didn't even have to join the group to download them so it did not take a Raphael Manfredi or a Tor Klingberg to document the gnutella protocol.

hope those guys and also Shareaza keep their motivation to innovate and help the Gnutella community

Shareaza chose to create its own proprietary protocol instead.

Open source project on windows: Gnucleus project

[SailFly]

I used to contribute to this project, and enjoyed learning about the protocol this way. Today, I have little time to give in this area, but wanted to share with those who haven't come across:

Gnucleus

Timing.

[Grendel Drago]

Well... NNTP servers cost money, at least decent ones do. Also, there's the retention problem. What, you wanted last year's Buffy episodes? Sorry, those have been swept off the server for months now. ShareReactor releases may occasionally lack sources, but ask on the forum and someone will reshare. Anything on the mainpage will have sources, even if it's months old.

--grendel drago

Re:Timing.

[Ashran]

Well you can use a cheap unlimited bandwith server for your main downloads (www.usenetserver.com) and use a premium server for fills (www.easynews.com)[also has a global search and ~50 days rentention].
If you're nice and do a REQ someone will do a 'reshare' as well ;)

Granted you wont get everything, but you might not find it with with ShareReaktor either.

Counting the total amount of data aviable - i think usenet will still win.

Hybrids.

[Grendel Drago]

Well, ShareReactor works just as well with Overnet, since the peer-to-peer communication part is identical and the links work just the same, partial file sharing, blah blah blah. Also, see here. Future versions of eMule may support Overnet as well as server-based communication. The lastest eDonkey does. (The 'hybrid'.)

Anyway, ed2k servers are pretty easy to set up, and it's not like they all live in the basement of the ed2k Corporation, Inc, a la Napster.

--grendel drago

P2p linux client Question?

[makoffee]

So far I han't found a p2p client that I like for linux yet. Right now I'm using giFT, but do any of you /.ers have any ideas?

Re:P2p linux client Question?

[Anonymous Coward]

I personally use Gtk-Gnutella (both as my server and a client). I've been looking into using Mutella, since I serve a lot more files (OGG! ;) than I download though (and I'd rather not rely on having X running for when I'm serving).

Re:P2p linux client Question?

[WWWWolf]

So far I han't found a p2p client that I like for linux yet. Right now I'm using giFT, but do any of you /.ers have any ideas?

giFT =) After napster's demise the only p2p app that has worked for me right out of box and worked well...

Mutella seems pretty nice, but I would avoid its web UI. Bad Mac imitation.

Re:P2p linux client Question?

[Bitsy Boffin]

Overnet, the sucessor to Edonkey is my client of choice at the moment, I was using KazaaLite under a VMWare windows install but I dropped that a month or so ago and just use Overnet under Linux now.

I just had to run shareaza

[Anonymous Coward]

I just had to run shareaza while reading that article.

Comments from Gnutella2 developer

[Anonymous Coward]

have a look on first post in this thread, it's from Mike (the Gnutella2 developer) and he is commenting the interviews:
http://www.shareaza.com/forum/viewthread.aspx?ID=5 138

A quote from the ending:

"The Gnutella developer community, or at least the subset of it that Vinnie [Bearshare developer] is referring to here, is happy to trust you if you're not a threat to its comfortable pace. There are much more important goals than having that trust.
I hope this clears up any misconceptions that may have resulted from reading the original interview. Unfortunately this isn't the first time (and probably won't be the last time) someone attacks Shareaza's credibility with unfounded accusations."

Copyright can be useful

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, perhaps they should have copyrighted the Gnutella name so that not every nancy-boy that came along could use it for their own closed protocol, and we wouldn't have all of this pointless whining and kindergarten-level fighting.

But oh no, that would ruin the "free" spirit of the whole thing, and we can't deal with things that expose our ideology as, possibly, imperfect, or even wrongheaded. Copyright is bad, trading stuff copyrighted by everyone else is good!

Alternative to Gnutella2

[mattficken]

I recently started a project on sourceforge called G8 (http://geight.sourceforge.net/). Its goal is to modify Gnutella to become the Search Protocol for the internet. This will take the place of search engines and will be able to find content that search engines miss. The proposed network architecture is similar to Ultrapeers, except the new 'Routers' route searches only to those routers or servants that they think will most likely have the information. This allows for developers to test new search algorithms, doing for searching what open-source has done for software. Further, by legitimizing Gnutella into a standard protocol, it will be difficult for ISPs to filter or block it out. If you value your ability to search the internet and your ability to use Gnutella, I ask you to help this project. Matt Ficken (mattficken@users.sourceforge.net) http://geight.sourceforge.net/

Mike's response

[soupdevil]

Check out this thread on Shareaza's forum if you want to read Mike's thoughtful response to Vinnie.

http://www.shareaza.com/forum/viewthread.aspx?ID =5 138

Lies? Truth, nothing but truth!

[Anonymous Coward]

Crap. The papers have always been available at the GDF yahoogroup and at LimeWire.com. You didn't even have to join the group to download them so it did not take a Raphael Manfredi or a Tor Klingberg to document the gnutella protocol.

Crap? No. The papers were a complicated mix of old documents and new additions (most not documented nor indexed).

Even worse, you had to search a path through old v0.4 specs, old GDF postings and finally reading open source code (to reverse engineer what the core communication does). Then you had to test your own Gnutella code against other clienst and ask on the GDF why it doesn't work with client x or client y. Usually you did crash into Vinnies non-conform client. There were no papers, no RFC, or support for new developers. The GDF in the beginning did even hide from new devlopers, it's still a kind of Bearshare-Limewire elite group that try to keep control. Regarding old Xolox, they didn't invite or inform them about well hidden GDF, instead stated unbased accusations about a technology that now is in every client. Doh! Don't forget Bearshare is prorietary and contrary to Shareaza the programmer needs his "ADWARE" money. *cough*
So let me resume.... no efficient sourounding, no open minded environment and no brief documents. Oh and in the beginning there was a civil war between the only two commercial vendors Bearshare and Limewire. Now best friends shaking each others hands, because they found a common interest and better targets. I remember a good quote from Vinnie at that time: "growing a stable network and encouraging new developers are mutually exclusive". It's in the GDF archives.

Raphael's and Tor's Gnutella RFC was actually the first step towards a usefull Gnutella documentation. I once was interested in Gnutella development, but the greed, lies and inefficient inovations did tell me... this is no place to be. I have respect for those who did stay and played a role in this soap opera (I guess even a job in Redmond is giving you more codingg fun - wow what sarcasm hehe).

What those interviews are really about: bitching against a new big player on the Gnutella playground. It wasn't said often enough: Vinnie is splitting Gnutella, he is doing it now and nobody else. Justin (from Winamp) should invent G3 in his free time, but I fear he dont want to waste his time with endless GDF arguing. AFAIK G2 was never planed nor designed nor announced as a proprietary network, so your false rumours are wrong. Prolly the best that Mike can do is posting the G2 specs as planed (....before Duke Nukem Forever comes out *grin).

Have fun, Mark

PS: See Mike's comments (warning long post) http://www.shareaza.com/forum/viewthread.aspx?ID=5 138
PPS: You should tell your Ultapeer explanation to Limewire, I'm sure they appreciate a reasonable explanation. :)

Re:Lies? Truth, nothing but truth!

[John W. Lindh]

No. The papers were a complicated mix of old documents and new additions (most not documented nor indexed).

You are an idiot. And I'm not even going to bother explaining to you in detail why those papers are not complex at all for the experienced developer.

Even worse, you had to search a path through old v0.4 specs, old GDF postings and finally reading open source code (to reverse engineer what the core communication does). Then you had to test your own Gnutella code against other clienst and ask on the GDF why it doesn't work with client x or client y.

Most of those questions came from dim-witted school boys who thought they could be the next Shawn Fanning because they had read "A Beginner's Guide To Visual Basic". Most of them didn't even bother to read the specs carefully.

AFAIK G2 was never planed nor designed nor announced as a proprietary network, so your false rumours are wrong.

Look up the meaning of the word 'proprietary', please.

Re:Lies? Truth, nothing but truth!

[Anonymous Coward]

You are an idiot. And I'm not even going to bother explaining to you in detail why those papers are not complex at all for the experienced developer.

Bitching is low. Come back with some founded arguments next time.

Mark

easy solution

[acidrain69]

The gnutella developers need to get their asses in gear and rename what they were developing Gnutella3. And continue to publicly shun Shareaza. And pick apart it's implementation.

I think shareaza has a right to make improvements to the software, but I don't think they have any right to take the gnutella2 name.

Bittorrent

[harmonica]

eDonkey is good for large files, albeit slow. I've been using BitTorrent for a lot of my large files (the latest buffy and anime fansubs) lately, although I don't know if this counts as P2P.

Sure, you are (potentially) downloading from several people and, at the same time, uploading to several others. Relatively centralized (but that's why it works so well, IMO).

Re:Bittorrent

[Anenga]

The problem with BitTorrent is that it's system is flawed. When you close the window after downloading, your not sharing anymore. Thus people often find they can download 80% of the file and can't ever get the rest. Thus, only downloading 0day releases within a few days of their release is only when BitTorrent works well.

Also, you can't search on BitTorrent. You have to find websites to download from. If the website gets shut down, so does the ability to get the files.

Re:Bittorrent

[harmonica]

Thus, only downloading 0day releases within a few days of their release is only when BitTorrent works well.

True (from my limited experience), but it still is p2p, even if it is specialized.

Also, you can't search on BitTorrent. You have to find websites to download from. If the website gets shut down, so does the ability to get the files.

Yes, but again, BT is a specialized p2p tool, not flawed. It cannot (and probably never wanted to) replace protocols like those used with Freenet or Gnutella.

The design goal was to make big files available to a relatively large number of people who know exactly what they want, with everyone participating in sharing the load.

But you made me think about a definition of p2p. I would probably come up with something very general.

A slide I found suggests that there is no consensus on the term. searchNetworking has a more precise definition. Hm, I'll do some reading...

Re:Bittorrent

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never had partially successful downloads using BitTorrent: 97% of attempted dl's completed, very occasionally a BT link will fail to connect to a working tracker. Time since release is a crucial factor.

The fact that it isn't a *network search* tool can be viewed as a feature: you get file links from sites you trust, there's no faked files going around.

PS if the site goes down, I share all my .torrents on FastTrack. or ask for them in the relevant IRC channels, e.g. #tvtorrents on efnet.

spanky.

mutella

[akb]

I love mutella for its terminal client and web interface.

Re:mutella

[Anenga]

Don't use Mutella! It re-queries the network every 60 seconds and is bringing the network to it's knees (Gnutella1 that is, G2 is unaffected).

Re:mutella

[hageshii]

Ugh! Yeah, I found out about this and notified Max, the lead coder for Mutella. He says he's sorry and is going to fix that in the next version.

BearShare's creator is foolish

[M3wThr33]

Limewire and Xolox's creator's were very civil discussing it. Bearshare's guy actully posted a rant on a forum with SEVERAL cuss words and went out of control. That's why I've been banning BearShare users when they try to download from me. I want that program to die now. I don't care how good it is. If the creator can't be mature about it, I can't support it.

Re:BearShare's creator is foolish

[Anonymous Coward]

Vinney's always been like that - it's fine for BearShare to add proprietary stuff and cause problems for others, but if any other peer does anything at all, even something useful, he'll out-and-out lie to slander it or threaten to block it. In Vinney's mind BearShare is the "Guntella community" and all other peers should bow to his will.

the bottom line...

[havaloc]

...is that Shareaza is free of ads and spyware, and give the end user the best experience that can be had on any Gnutella class clients. That's what matters in the end.

I'm also sorry I supported Limewire twice by purchasing the pro edition to support their efforts. Wasted money. Live and learn I guess.

Learn IP law

[Anonymous Coward]

>perhaps they should have copyrighted the Gnutella name You can't copyright a product name; you make it a trademark. Nullsoft could have been trademarked the name, but they don't care about gnutella (or more acurately, AOL/TW won't let them care).

End of the Beginning

[Anonymous Coward]

I work for a Intrusion Prevention System company and actually did indepth analysis work on the Shareaza so called Gnutella2 protocol.

I've found it to be very restrictive in the fact that NONE of the other Gnutella clients can PROPERLY attach to a Shareaza client/cloud.

This inclusion/exclusion is a basic divide and conquer approach to the Gnutella community.

IF you download Shareaza, you are driving the wedge further and deeper apart.

Stop!

Vincent / Bearshare

[rsax]

It's really hard to take this Vincent character seriously considering how immature he seems to be. I mean come on, try proving your point(s) without calling other people "son of a whore". That is just plain stupid. And lets see: Shareaza.. free, no spyware, no adware, works better, better interface, stable. Bearshare, Limewire on the other hand: spyware, adware, and not as refined as Shareaza. Who's spyware/adware revenues are being hurt here? With that being said, the Shareaza author should redeem himself too by releasing the full Gnutella2 specs, after all, he's using the "Gnutella" name. Then again, gnutella3.com seems to be registered by the immature Bearshare author and who's said that gnutella3 protocol will be proprietary.. blah, what a mess. All I know is that if Shareaza starts bundling any spyware then it's back to ftp/irc exclusively for me.

Re:Vincent / Bearshare

[Ziviyr]

I got dibs on gnutella4.com!

Mike's Response

[Anonymous Coward]

Mike's response to these very one-sided stories can be found here: http://www.shareaza.com/forum/viewthread.aspx?ID=5 138

Ohura movies but no pics.

[Anonymous Coward]

Shareaza just doesn't work very well when you're trying to share 4 gigs of bluebird scans.

My favorite P2P....

[mbourgon]

Is the NNTP protocol. NNTP Peer to NNTP Peer, and then I grab the files from them. Works well, especially keeping SVCDs on the BTVS episode I just watched on TV. a.b.m.b-v-s

here's the bottom line

[Anonymous Coward]

Other than a handful of geeks, nobody gives a rat's ass.

Hope that clears things up.

You're f'ing welcome.

on a mac

[Anonymous Coward]

I might install Windows under VirtualPC, but that's just too much crap for me. Kazaa won't give me a client, so to hell with them.

In response to Jack Valenti

[Anonymous Coward]

we need ip address spoofing, and encrypted connections.

Otherwise gnutella, and all other p2p is dead.

WinMX

[jjga]

Another excellent (although only available for Windows AFAIK) P2P system is WinMX.

funny

[No-op]

Mind you, moral arguments about operating systems sound rather humorous in the context of which application lets you steal content faster :)

DC++

[Anonymous Coward]

I have found DC++ to be a really good p2p method. Why isn't it as popular as Kazaa or Gnutella, even though it has no spyware and can have really good dl speeds? Not to mention that you can connect to several servers with usualy 50tb means you should find what you are looking for. I have no trouble finding movies music etc. So why does no one use it?

Re:DC++

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about DC++, but the original DirectConnect client was basically FTP wrapped in IRC with a search engine. As a result, file transfer was based on filenames rather than IDs, there was no possibility to get a file from multiple sources and once a source disappeared, you had to "guess" if a similarly named file offered by another peer was actually the same file or not.

But yes, directconnect does have some good stuff, it forces users to share a certain amount and the people using it usually have very fast connections. If you want something fast, then it's a good application. It just requires more work to download than eDonkey or Kazaa, where you just click on a file and the download process will take care of itself no matter how peers come and go.

Not quite 50 days

[fendel]

More like 32 days right now, at least in the groups that I know of. Nothing to sneeze at, anyhow.

And some ISPs have decent news servers. Mine has good completion but lousy retention. If I want to grab anything there, I have to check the newsgroups just about every day. Still beats trying to download SVCD video on my $10-per-6-GB Easynews account.

Easy!

[Rares Marian]

So then...

You can prevent abuse!

You just said the hostile client closed the connection.

Also, it can be improved thusly:
1. Allow no more than Y querries total from the whole net.
2. At the time that it happens, find the average querries per host based on a minimum unit of difference between each host in descending order of querries. This is to prevent those who try to buddy up in overquerrying from raising the average.

3. Ignore those below the average.
4. Add up the totals of all those above the average.
5. Using that same difference unit, get group totals to find the most common ones (buddies or accident they cause trouble either way).

6. Reorder them according to those group totals in descending order. This way the ones most likely to respawn are blocked. We're not the morality police here, just the fairness police. If some harrassment is happening that isn't killing the network, it isn't worth taking away from feature development. Argue it in the discussions not in the code if it's a "small claims" case. We can add features to make sure the abuse isn't killing users' individual connections.

7. Find the average of these.

8. Ban the top 2/3s over the second average for an hour
9. Disconnect the bottom 1/3 over the second average (it'd be great if we could just suspend and any client that refused to suspend would be banned for days).

Last Post!

[alpg]

THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #10: SIMPLE

SIMPLE is an acronym for Sheer Idiot's Monopurpose Programming Language
Environment. This language, developed at the Hanover College for
Technological Misfits, was designed to make it impossible to write code
with errors in it. The statements are, therefore, confined to BEGIN,
END and STOP. No matter how you arrange the statements, you can't make
a syntax error. Programs written in SIMPLE do nothing useful. Thus
they achieve the results of programs written in other languages without
the tedious, frustrating process of testing and debugging.

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...