Subject: Bittorrent?

From: Josh Berkus <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 11:55:10 -0800

Marc, Dave, etc.,

I realize that it's a bit 11th-hour, but two community members have complained 
about sluggishness on some of the FTP mirrors.   Have we given any thought to 
putting up source on Bitorrent?

-- 
-Josh Berkus
 Aglio Database Solutions
 San Francisco

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 16:09:10 -0400 (AST)

If I'm reading the FAQ/Documentation correctly ... and I may not be
understanding it completely after a admittedly quick pursual ... it sounds
like a 'napster for files', with ppl uploading to our servers, as well as
downloading from it?

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From: Josh Berkus <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 12:13:34 -0800

Marc,

> like a 'napster for files', with ppl uploading to our servers, as well as

Yes, but they're OSS-friendly, popular, and several members of our community 
already use Bitorrent.  Among other things, Linux kernels get distributed 
over it.  It uses the p2p network to bypass bottlenecks at certain ftp sites, 
allowing you to stream the same download from 2-5 sites simultaneosly and 
saturate your download bandwidth.

I don't think we necessarily need to host a Bitorrent server at hub.org; I'm 
not clear on how joining bitorrent works, really.   I'll ask one of the 
current users.

-- 
-Josh Berkus

______AGLIO DATABASE SOLUTIONS___________________________
                                        Josh Berkus
   Complete information technology 	[email-masked]
    and data management solutions 	(415) 565-7293
   for law firms, small businesses 	 fax 621-2533
    and non-profit organizations. 	San Francisco

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From: Bruce Momjian <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 15:37:27 -0500 (EST)

> not clear on how joining bitorrent works, really.   I'll ask one of the 

What if someone adds a trojan to the source and puts it on Bitorrent? 
Doesn't seem like something we should do lightly.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian                        |  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  [email-masked]               |  (610) 359-1001
  +  If your life is a hard drive,     |  13 Roberts Road
  +  Christ can be your backup.        |  Newtown Square, Pennsylvania 19073

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 16:38:21 -0400 (AST)

> not clear on how joining bitorrent works, really.   I'll ask one of the

if it was possible to be a download only server, I have no problems with
setting it up ... I'd just hate to see a whack of warez
uploaded/downloaded from the server, or porn, or .. :)

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From: Jeroen Ruigrok/asmodai <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 21:49:50 +0100

>not clear on how joining bitorrent works, really.   I'll ask one of the 

You just take an official tarball, put it in your share folder and 'seed
it' as the torrent community calls it, that is, you spread the hash on
the file for people to add to their torrent download list.

Principle is the same as with SoulSeek, KaZaA, Edonkey, etc...

-- 
Jeroen Ruigrok van der Werven <asmodai(at)wxs.nl> / asmodai / kita no mono
PGP fingerprint: 2D92 980E 45FE 2C28 9DB7  9D88 97E6 839B 2EAC 625B
http://www.tendra.org/   | http://www.in-nomine.org/~asmodai/diary/
Dream, a noise, the wind awakes me, and you're already here...

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 16:51:25 -0400 (AST)

> Principle is the same as with SoulSeek, KaZaA, Edonkey, etc...

Ya, but we don't distribute on those either :)

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 16:52:16 -0400 (AST)

> Doesn't seem like something we should do lightly.

That one isn't so big a deal, as we could easily made the 'official md5
hashes' available on the web site, which is easier to access then the ftp
server(s) ... then the oneous(sp?) is on the downloader to confirm that
the md5's check out okay ...

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From: Josh Berkus <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 12:55:41 -0800

Marc,

> the md5's check out okay ...

"onus"

I've asked a friend of Bram Cohen's to answer some of these questions for us.

In the meantime, check out:
<http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/guide.html>

It appears that we don't have to be a P2P server to offer PostgreSQL on 
bitorrent, only to download it. 

-- 
-Josh Berkus
 Aglio Database Solutions
 San Francisco

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From: Josh Berkus <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 14:54:18 -0800

Folks,

Answers:

1) As Bitorrent content providers, we only need to offer a main content site 
and an SHA1 encrypted hash called a "tracker".  We do not have to host other 
people's files.

2) Trojans are prevented by the "tracker" which serves the same function as an 
MD5 in verifying content, and as Bram Cohen is a cryptography expert, I trust 
this mechanism.

3) As far as offering the BT file, we need just add the .bittorrent link to 
the downloads page after doing the setup.

I think we should do this.

-- 
-Josh Berkus
 Aglio Database Solutions
 San Francisco

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From: Bruce Momjian <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 18:20:15 -0500 (EST)

OK, my security concerns have been answered.

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

Josh Berkus wrote:
> ---------------------------(end of broadcast)---------------------------
> TIP 5: Have you checked our extensive FAQ?
> 
>                http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faqs/FAQ.html
>

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 19:29:40 -0400 (AST)

'k, sounds reasonable ... will this effectively "mirror" our current ftp
structure, or will we have to duplicate whatever files we want offered in
a seperate location?  and are there any instructions for doing this on a
non-Windows machine?  Everything I've seen so far seems very
windows-centric ...

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From: Josh Berkus <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 15:32:39 -0800

Marc,

> non-Windows machine?  Everything I've seen so far seems very

Meet David Fetter, who recommended BitTorrent.   David, can you help Marc?

-- 
-Josh Berkus
 Aglio Database Solutions
 San Francisco

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From: David Fetter <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 16:10:12 -0800

On Tue, Nov 04, 2003 at 03:32:39PM -0800, Josh Berkus wrote:
> Marc,
> 
> > 'k, sounds reasonable ... will this effectively "mirror" our
> > current ftp structure, or will we have to duplicate whatever files
> > we want offered in a seperate location?  and are there any
> > instructions for doing this on a non-Windows machine?  Everything
> > I've seen so far seems very windows-centric ...
> 

I'd be delighted :)   Is there some thing in the server guide
(<http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/guide.html>) that you're having
trouble with?

Cheers,
D
-- 
David Fetter [email-masked] http://fetter.org/
phone: +1 510 893 6100    cell: +1 415 235 3778

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From: "Marc G. Fournier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2003 20:15:46 -0400 (AST)

Am talking with David off list on details for setting things up ...