P2P Systems Techniques and Challenges

Peer-to-peer (P2P) applications have recently attracted a large number of Internet users. Traditional P2P systems however, suffer from inefficiency due to lack of information from the underlay, i.e. the physical network.

Despite all the efforts been put in, a gap has been witnessed between the simulation figured and results and actual real world scenarios. Some researchers have admitted that these simulation results can no way be compared to what they might face in real world networking environment, other than a few researches.

Notable effort and resources are yet to be put into most of these researches in order to make them viable for a real world practical application. One such example is the peer to peer communication optimization which can be very useful for multiplayer gaming and overall file sharing and communication on the Internet.

Other such experiments in the labs have shown extremely positive results which can change the dynamics of underlying networks

New P2P Systems:

• File sharing was first P2P application

• Other applications are coming to light

• BitTorrent: focus more on content distribution than file sharing

– Makes use of common research result (DHT) since 2005

• P2P extending beyond file sharing: Skype

– Skype is a P2P telephone “system”

– Can call other computers, or normal phones

– Based on the KaZaA network

• P2P streaming systems

– PPLive, PPStream

P2P	Client-Server
No central server	Central Server
Suitable for small business org.	Scalable
Inexpensive	Expensive
Not secure	Secure

Conclusion:

Both the peer to peer and client server architectures have their own pros and cons. It depends on the organizational architecture that what suits the best in a particular scenario.

Client Server architectures are expensive and can accommodate large number of users. They are scalable.

For an organization with 30 nodes and data security not an issue, peer to peer is the recommended network architecture. It is cost effective as well as suitable for small organizations.