P2P

Application-level overlays
Site 2 Site 3 N

N ISP1 ISP2 N

Site 1
N ISP3 N

• One per application

N Site 4
• Nodes are decentralized

P2P systems are overlay networks without central control

 Client/Server Limitations

• Scalability is hard to achieve

• Presents a single point of failure
• Requires administration
• Unused resources at the network edge

• P2P systems try to address these limitations

 Client-Server Versus Peer-to-
Peer Network Architecture
• A simple distinction
– Client-server
• Computers perform asymmetric functions
– Peers-to-Peer (P2P)
• Computers perform symmetric functions
• Different architectures offer different benefits
• Pure P2P networks are rare
– Most P2P networks rely on centralized server for some
functions
 What is P2P?

…a technology that enables • File/information/resource

two or more peers to sharing
collaborate
spontaneously in a
network of equal peers by • Equal peers
using appropriate
information and • Decentralization
communication systems
without the necessity for
central coordination.
 Client/Server Model Peer to Peer Model
Assumption Assumption

Workstation is so powerless Workstation is powerful

that it can not do any task. enough to do some jobs
Only User (Operator) can Other workstation and server can
control the workstation remote-control the workstation

Server Server

result Order result Order

Pure P2P
Workstation Workstation Workstation
(Client) (Client) (Client)
 P2P Network Features
• Clients are also servers and routers
– Nodes contribute content, storage, memory, CPU
• Nodes are autonomous (no administrative
• authority)
• Network is dynamic: nodes enter and leave the
• network “frequently”
• Nodes collaborate directly with each other (not
• through well-known servers)
• Nodes have widely varying capabilities
 Features of the P2P Computing
• P2P computing is the sharing of computer resources and
services by direct exchange between systems.

• These resources and services include the exchange of

information, processing cycles, cache storage, and disk
storage for files.

• P2P computing takes advantage of existing computing

power, computer storage and networking connectivity,
allowing users to leverage their collective power to the
‘benefit’ of all.
 P2P Architecture
• All nodes are both clients
and servers
– Provide and consume data Node
– Any node can initiate a Node
connection
Node

Internet
• No centralized data
source
– “The ultimate form of Node Node
democracy on the
Internet”
– “The ultimate threat to
copy-right protection on
the Internet”
 P2P Network Characteristics
• Clients are also servers and routers
– Nodes contribute content, storage, memory, CPU
• Nodes are autonomous (no administrative authority)
• Network is dynamic: nodes enter and leave the
network “frequently”
• Nodes collaborate directly with each other (not
through well-known servers)
• Nodes have widely varying capabilities
Client-Server vs. Peer-to-Peer
Example P
e
Cl e
ie r
n -
t t
– o
S -
e P
r e
v e
e r
r
 Large-Scale Data Sharing: P2P

Internet
Client
Client Cache
Client Proxy Client

Client
server server Client Peer-to-peer model

Client Congestion zone Client/ Client/

Client Client/
Server Server Server
Client
Client
Client/
Server Client/
Client/server model server server Server

Client/ Congestion zone Client/

Server
Server
Client/
Server Client/
Server
 P2P History: 1969 - 1995
• 1969 – 1995: the origins
– In the beginning, all nodes in Arpanet/Internet were peers
– Every node was capable to
• perform routing (locate machines)
• accept ftp connections (file sharing)
• accept telnet connections (distributed computation)

‘50 ‘60 ‘70 ‘80 ‘90

1994
1971 1992 10k Web Servers
1957 1962 email appears 50 Web Servers
Sputnik Arpa
1969 1990
Arpanet WWW proposed
 P2P History: 1995 - 1999
• 1995 – 1999: the Internet explosion
– The original “state of grace” was lost
– Current Internet is organized hierarchically (client/server)
• Relatively few servers provide services
• Client machines are second-class Internet citizens
(cut off from the DNS system, dynamic address)

‘50 ‘60 ‘70 ‘80 ‘90

1994
1971 1992 10k Web Servers
1957 1962 email appears 50 Web Servers
Sputnik Arpa
1969 1990
Arpanet WWW proposed
 P2P History: 1999 - today
• 1999 – today: the advent of Napster
– Jan 1999: the first version of Napster is released by
Shawn Fanning, student at Northeastern University
– Jul 1999: Napster, Inc. founded
• In short time, Napster gains an enormous success,
enabling millions of end-users to establish a file-
sharing network for the exchange of music files
– Jan 2000: Napster unique users > 1.000.000
– Nov 2000: Napster unique users > 23.000.000
– Feb 2001: Napster unique users > 50.000.000
p2p \pir too pir\ n. a virtual network of functionally
similar nodes created using an alternate, often
private, namespace
Node

Node

Node

Node

PDA

Server

Comm. Tower
Router

Router

Internet

Server

Router
Modem

Modem

Modem

Modem
 P2P Benefits
• Efficient use of resources
– Unused bandwidth, storage, processing power at the edge of the network

• Scalability
– Since every peer is alike, it is possible to add more peers to the system and scale to
larger networks
– Consumers of resources also donate resources
– Aggregate resources grow naturally with utilization

• Reliability
– Replicas
– Geographic distribution
– No single point of failure
• E.g., the Internet and the Web do not have a central point of failure.
• Most internet and web services use the client-server model (e.g. HTTP), so a specific
service does have a central point of failure
• Ease of administration
– Nodes self organize
– No need to deploy servers to satisfy demand – confer (compare, c.f.) scalability
– Built-in fault tolerance, replication, and load balancing
The traditional network
architecture
 A hybrid P2P network
architecture
• A hybrid P2P architecture
 P2P must be disruptive…

• Peer-to-peer (p2p): third generation of the Internet

• 1st generation: “raw” Internet
• 2nd generation: the Web
• 3rd generation: making new services to users
cheaply and quickly by making use of their PCs as
active participants in computing processes
• P2P doing this in “disruptive” ways
Bandwidth and Storage Growth
> Moore’s Law
• Network, Storage and Computers
– Network speed doubles every 9 months
– Storage size doubles every 12 months
– Computer speed doubles every 18 months
• 1986 to 2000
– Computers : X 500
– Storage : X 16,000
– Networks : X 340,000
• 2001 to 2010
– Computers : X 60
– Storage : X 500
– Networks : X 4000

Graph from Scientific American (Jan 2001) by Cleo Villett,

source Vined Khoslan, Kleiner, Caufield and Perkins.
 Moore’s Law
• In 1965, Gordon Moore predicted that the number of transistors that can be
integrated on a die would double every 18 to 14 months
• i.e., grow exponentially with time
• Amazing visionary – million transistor/chip barrier was crossed in the 1980’s.
– 2300 transistors, 1 MHz clock (Intel 4004) - 1971
– 42 Million, 2 GHz clock (Intel P4) - 2001
– 140 Million transistor (HP PA-8500)

Source: Intel web page (www.intel.com)

Peer-peer networking
Peer-peer networking
Focus at the application level
How it works
 Classification of the P2P Systems
Three main categories of systems

• Centralized systems: peer connects to server which

coordinates and manages communication. e.g. SETI@home

• Brokered systems: peers connect to a server to discover

other peers, but then manage the communication themselves
(e.g. Napster). This is also called Brokered P2P.

• Decentralized systems: peers run independently with no

central services. Discovery is decentralized and
communication takes place between the peers. e.g. Gnutella,
Freenet

True P2P
 What P2P is good for?
• Community Web network
– Any group with specific common interests, including a family
or hobbyists, can use lists and a Web site to create their own
intranet.
• Search engines
– Fresh, up-to-date information can be found by searching
directly across the space where the desired item is likely to
reside
• Collaborative development
– The scope can range from developing software products to
composing a document to applications like rendering graphics.
 P2P Application Areas
• Communication
– AOL Instant Messenger
– ICQ
• Remote Collaboration (Shared File Editing, Audio-video Conferencing)
– Jabber
– Shared whiteboard
• Multiplayer Games
– Unreal Tournament, DOOM
• Streaming (Application-level Multicast)
– Narada
– Yoid
– NICE, CAN-Multicast, Scribe
• Distributed Computing
– SETI@home
• File Sharing
– Napster
– Gnutella, Freenet, LimeWire
– KazaA, Morpheus
• Ad-hoc networks
 File-sharing vs. Streaming
• File-sharing
– Download the entire file first, then use it
– Small files (few Mbytes)  short download time
– A file is stored by one peer  one connection
– No timing constraints
• Streaming
– Consume (playback) as you download
– Large files (few Gbytes)  long download time
– A file is stored by multiple peers  several connections
– Timing is crucial
 Example P2P Applications
• The following areas are detailed in the following slides:
– Instant Messaging
– File exchange
– Collaboration
– MIPS sharing
– Lookup services
– Mobile ad hoc communication
– Content Distribution
– Middleware
 Instant Messaging
• A convenient way of communicating with a small group of selected people (e.g., friends,
family members, etc.)
• Usually, a central server is used to store user profiles and to have a list of registered
users
• While communication takes place between the peers, searching for other people is done
using the server
• One of the reasons why a server is needed is the ability to send messages to other
persons (i.e., peers)
• If the target peer is not online, the system has to store the message until the target
• peers becomes online again
• This would be, of course, also possible with a server-less P2P system, but the price
would be an increased complexity and a certain probability of messages getting lost
• Examples for such systems are:
– Napster
– ICQ
– threedegrees
– Jabber
 File exchange
• There is little dispute about the
usefulness of P2P file sharing
applications
• While downloading files is
always done directly between
peers (or via a proxy peer to
enable anonymity), the way of
searching for these files differs
in many P2P applications
• Some use central servers (e.g.,
Napster) while others send
search requests
• directly to other peers (e.g.,
Gnutella, Freenet, & FastTrack)
 Collaboration
• This is not a typical example for the usefulness of P2P technology
• It is about having people having the same view or different views on shared
information
• This would typically call for a server storing this information
• This way, the information is available to all members without the necessity of
having the information provider or contributor online or the data distributed to
all other participants
• But there are use cases where P2P technology comes in mobile phones
• One example could be ad hoc collaboration of devices in an environment
where no connection to a server exist
– E.g., people are meeting in a place where no connection to the Internet is available
• In this scenario, people would communicate (and collaborate) in a server-less
P2P manner
• One perfect example for this use case is Groove
– It uses a server to store shared information but is also able to provide collaboration
services without the existence of such a server
 MIPS sharing
• One of the major assets of the Internet is its combined processing power
– which is currently vastly under-utilized
• To utilize these resources, user are asked to download and install programs that are able
to do a small part of a complex computation while the computer is not used
– E.g., while the screen saver is running
• Examples for MIPS sharing systems are:
– Seti@HOME
– Genome@HOME
• In this category of P2P applications, the social aspect is very important
• Were it not for the search for extraterrestrial life or cancer research, not many people
would be willing to share their processing power
– Hence, there must an incentive for users to share computer resources, be it money, public well-
fare or the like
• Furthermore, this type of P2P application can only function with a central server that is
coordinating the distribution of computation tasks and the validation of the results
 Lookup services
• Most of the scientific P2P research is done in the area of lookup services
• This is not very surprising because searching is one of the major challenges in
P2P networks
• Most of the P2P systems that are optimized for lookup services are using
distributed hashtables (DHT)
– which are capable of searching with logarithmic complexity
• The drawback of most of these systems is the fact that they are only able to
search for numbers
– In case they are searching for strings, they are searching for numerical
representations of these strings
• Examples for such systems are:
– PAST
– Chord
– P-Grid
 Mobile ad hoc communication
• Ad hoc communication, especially when it is done among mobile devices
– I.e., the devices are connected directly via a wireless communication link
– This is the best example for the usefulness of the P2P paradigm
• Devices connect to each other in an ad hoc manner
• Due to the limited communication capabilities of mobile devices (such as
mobile phones or handheld devices), frequent disconnections may occur
• When mobile devices are connected together, there is no guarantee that a
central server may be available
• Hence, ad hoc mobile communication must not rely on the existence of such a
server
• All these characteristics also apply to the P2P paradigm
• There exists only a small number of P2P systems that can be used in
conjunction with small devices:
– GnuNet
– JXME (JXTA for J2ME - the Java 2 Mobile Environment)
 Content Distribution
• P2P can also be used for the distribution of information or files
– sometimes called ESD - electronic software distribution
• Instead of having a central source that emits files to the destination
computers directly, a P2P network may disseminate files while
avoiding hot spots in the network
• The load (i.e., the bandwidth, CPU power, throughput, etc.) is
distributed over the whole network
• This concept is successfully used, for example, by Intel where
software is distributed to international branches in a P2P style
• This system can be compared to a push system
• The advantage is that there is no need for a fixed environment of push
server and proxies
 Middleware
• The most demanding use case for a P2P system is its use as a
middleware platform. P2P middleware systems provide services such
as distributed search or peer discovery to higher-level applications
• Different kind of P2P systems have a limited set of application
domains
• Depending on the structure (or topology) of the P2P network, various
use cases may become feasible or impossible
• If a P2P system is needed as a middleware, the use case turns the
balance which P2P system best fits the requirements
• Only a few P2P systems may be used as a P2P middleware platform:
– JXTA
– Omnix
Port Numbers Used by Various P2P
Applications
Timeline of P2P networking
evolution
 P2P Technical Challenges
• Peer identification
• Routing protocols
• Network topologies
• Peer discovery
• Communication/coordination protocols
• Quality of service
• Security
• Fine-grained resource management