TM
Bittorrent
A peer to peer file sharing
protocol
So what’s the plan?
Introduction: A Brief overview of what Bittorrent is,
how it works, its adoption and its impact on the network
Internals: In depth survey of the parts that make up the
Bittorrent protocol. Including bencoding, torrent file,
tracker protocol, peer-wire protocol and algorithms.
Extensions: Brief description of official and unofficial
extensions of the Bittorrent protocol.
Conclusion
So what is Bittorrent?
Definition: Bittorrent is a peer to peer network protocol
for sharing files over the web.
Peer-to-peer: Users consume and provide resources
directly to other users in the network without the need of
a central entity.
Application layer: Works on top of the TCP layer
Advantages: Concurrent download of different parts of
the file. Share files with large number of downloaders
with minimal increase in load.
Can I see?
How does it work?
1. The file provider(seed) makes the file available
on the network
2. Peers make requests for the file.
3. Peers get pieces of the file on a rarest first basis.
4. Peers make pieces that were already downloaded
available to other peers while downloading
missing pieces
5. Once a peer has all the parts that make the file if
will become a seed
Can I see?
* The image is taken for study purpose : [Link]
What are its parts?
Client: Piece of computer software that
implements the Bittorrent protocol. Peers are
nothing but computers running a Bittorrent client
Tracker: Server that articulatesthe
communication between peers in the Bittorrent
network
Torrent Files: Text file with a ”.torrent”
extension that contains metadata about a file
available on the network
Torrent Indexes: Web service that aggregates
torrent files
How do I use it?
1. Download and install a Bittorrent Client such as:
Bittorrent, Azureus, uTorrent
2. Use a Torrent Index to find and download the Torrent
file for the desired file, such as:
[Link]
[Link]
[Link]
3. Open the Torrent File with the client and start
downloading
4. Once the file is complete you may want to seed it for
a while
Who else uses it?
Bittorrent's adoption is incredibly widespread. Its users are not
only individuals looking to download files but also organizations
that use Bittorrent in order to reduce hosting expenses.
What the network impact?
CableLabs estimates that 18% of all broadband
traffic happens through the Bittorrent Protocol.
CacheLogic did a study in 2004 where it concluded
that as much as 35% of all internet traffic was
carried using the Bittorrent protocol.
The protocol also offers a challenge for network
routers that use Network Address Translation
(NAT). Most routers keep a 2000 records table
while Bittorrent client can easily make 300-500
requests per second.
Jay Patel
HTTP vs Bittorrent
FileTransfer – single stream vs random parts
Streaming – specific order vs random
Uplink – depends on server bandwidth vs seeder b/w.
Redundancy – not redundant vs can survive SPOF.
Server Load – Complete load vs Distributed load.
Encryption – HTTPS vs Message Stream Encryption
Bencoding
Way to specify and organize data in a tensed format.
Byte strings <string length>:<string data>
eg: 4:spam
Integers i<integer encoded in base ten ASCII>e
eg: i3e
Lists l<bencoded values>e
eg: l4:spam4:eggse == [ "spam", "eggs" ]
Dictionaries d<bencoded string><bencoded element>e
eg: d3:cow3:moo4:spam4:eggse == { "cow" => "moo", "spam" => "eggs" }
Metainfo File
To exchange files, a
Bittorrent client needs some
information about the
exchanged file(s).
This information is
contained within a file
named the “metainfo” file.
A sample torrent file
* The sample code: [Link]
Metainfo File
Peer wire Protocol
A client must maintain state information for each
connection with a remote peer.
Choking
Interested
• am_choking: this client is choking the peer
• am_interested: this client is interested in the peer
• peer_choking: peer is choking this client
• peer_interested: peer is interested in this client
Peer wire Protocol
Peer wire Protocol
Handshake
<pstrlen><pstr><reserved><info_hash><peer_id>
Pstrlen: String length of <pstr>
Pstr: String identifier of the protocol
Reserved: Reserved for future expansion
Info_hash: Info Key of metainfo(.torrent) file.
Peer_id: Unique id for the peer.
Peer wire Protocol
Messages
keep-alive: <len=0000>
choke: <len=0001><id=0>
unchoke: <len=0001><id=1>
interested: <len=0001><id=2>
not interested: <len=0001><id=3>
have: <len=0005><id=4><piece index>
bitfield: <len=0001+X><id=5><bitfield>
request: <len=0013><id=6><index><begin><length>
piece: <len=0009+X><id=7><index><begin><block>
cancel: <len=0013><id=8><index><begin><length>
port: <len=0003><id=9><listen-port>
Torrent Download Process
Devang Shah
Limitations
Despite the wonderful success of BTP, It suffers from some
fundamental problems which called as limitations of BTP
Content Unavaibility
Leech Problem
Single Point of Failure
Content Unavaibility
BTP is Less useful for
Unpopular Content
Consider: Publisher A
Publishing TV Shows
Suddenly Publisher goes
offline at Some Point
Peers Comes after initial
rush have to wait for the
content
Leech Problem
Leech Definition: The Peer downloading as well
as Uploading
Problem: Bit Torrent users leaves the swarm after
downloading all the require pieces.
If all the users do like that then swarm die out,
which results into lower possibility of content
available.
Single Point of Failure
Whole process control by the central server called
tracker
If tracker fails whole the process goes down.
Only those peers can exchanges the pieces which
are previously connected,
No new peers can join the swarm or no any peer
can connect to any other peer
Algorithm
PWP comes in the picture after the connection
established between peers
Aim of PWP is to facilitate the communication
between the peers
PWP does not force any standard algorithm for
that
Algorithm
Itshould not be constructed with goal in mind to
reduce the amount of data uploaded compare to
downloaded
Should not be strict to the Tit-For-Tat strategy
Should be good use of both upload & download
bandwidth
Should be cooperate with peers that implements
different algorithm
Pipelining
• When transferring data over TCP, it is critical to always
have several requests pending at once, to avoid a delay
between pieces being sent
• BitTorrent breaks pieces into sub-pieces
• At any point in time, some number, typically 5, are
requested simultaneously
• Every time a sub-piece arrives, a new request is sent
Piece Selection
The order in which pieces are selected by different
peers is critical for good performance
If a bad algorithm is used, we could end up in a
situation where every peer has all the pieces that
are currently available and none of the missing
ones
If the original seed is taken down, the file cannot
be completely downloaded!
Random First Piece
Initially,
a peer has nothing to trade
Important to get a complete piece ASAP
Rare pieces are typically available at fewer peers,
so downloading a rare piece initially is not a good
idea
Policy: Select a random piece of the file and
download it
Rarest Piece First
Policy: Determine the pieces that are most rare
among your peers and download those first
This ensures that the most common pieces are left
till the end to download
Rarest first also ensures that a large variety of
pieces are downloaded from the seed
Endgame Mode
Near the end, missing pieces are requested from
every peer containing them. When the piece
arrives, the pending requests for that piece are
cancelled.
This ensures that a download is not prevented
from completion due to a single peer with a slow
transfer rate.
Some bandwidth is wasted, but in practice, this is
not too much.
Official Extension
Fast Peer Extension
(i)HaveAll/HaveNone
(ii)Suggest the Pieces
(iii)Interested/Not Interested
(iv)Reject the Request
Distributed Hash Table
Unofficial Protocol
Azereus Messaging Protocol
Extension Protocol
Extension Negotiation Protocol
Bit Torrent Location -Aware Protocol
Conclusion
BTP may be The Next Version of Downloading
Methodology
Works on Concept of Distributing data Load over
the Users instead of
