Re: hanging up for the previous P2P user
On Mon, 2009-05-25 at 09:50 +0800, jidanni@jidanni.org wrote:
> Tony Baldwin writes:
>
> > I'm just guessing here, but I honestly thought killing the client
> > should stop the incoming connections from seeking the ip, so I'm a
> > little confused, and curious about the matter, now that you've brought
> > it up.
>
> I've used transsmission(1). When one wants to stop torrenting,
> transsmission spends several seconds saying proper goodbyes to the
> tracker or whatever, then exits.
>
> What I assume is happening here is when I connect to my ISP, the
> previous user of that IP address has not said these proper goodbyes,
> hence 'the liquor store has been converted to a church but not all the
> previous customer know that so they keep on knocking on the door'.
I was under the impression -- perhaps incorrect -- that it takes time
for information about which nodes are still available on the network at
any given time to spread across the network. I wouldn't necessarily
presume that the previous user hasn't said his "proper goodbyes," just
that the fact that he has signed off hasn't registered everywhere yet.
Likewise, when you shut down transmission, what it does is send your
transfer totals to the tracker (which is really only relevant if you're
using a private tracker, or some other tracker that needs to know your
ratios for some reason) and disconnects. But your availability on the
network has already spread to other clients connected to the same
trackers you're connected to, and in turn from them to still more
clients that will connect to those trackers. The clients don't
broadcast information about who has signed on or off -- they only
attempt to establish a connection when they're needing connections. So
someone coming on to the network, say, 15 minutes after you've left
might still try to connect to you because his client is getting
information from another client that doesn't know yet that you've left
(because it has not attempted to establish a connection with your client
in the time since you left). In a reasonably short period of time,
every client that knew about you will figure out that you are no longer
available, and will stop passing on your information.
It's kind of a daisy chain of information, where everybody's information
is not exactly up-to-the-minute, but it's current enough for the network
to function effectively. If everybody on the network knew, instantly,
when any given person had signed on or off, then it wouldn't really be a
decentralized network.
--
Michael M.
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