Basis of P2P:
? Sharing of Resources is a must among peers.
? Decentralization is one of the key aspects. (Note: P2P is a way of decentralizing not just features, but cost and administration as well)
? It should be able to handle temporary n/waddresses (variable connectivity).
Litmus test for P2P:
? Does it treat network connectivity and temporary n/w addresses as the norm?
? Does it give the nodes at the edge of the n/w significant autonomy?
In the case of distributed computing,there are components on the network that acts as severs, and they register themselves and advertise their properties. These servers serve the requests by clients and perform the computing for the clients. The baseline here is that all components on the network are not equal. The actions performed by components are different.
On the other hand when we talk about P2P, all computers on the network are equal. All are able to perform same actions. So typically the action performed is the same across all the peers. Thus the terminology ?serv-ent? is apt here. (Etymology: Server + Client)
When we think of the applications that can be developed using P2P, we can think of applications at 2 levels.
? System-Level
? Application-Level
I’ve been fiddling with this in mind and am thinking if on the system level would P2P be really useful for applications on Printers?? can one printer signal its other “peer” printer to finish it’s job cos it’s unable to do so cos of various reasonsviz. tray empty, out of memory, toner low etc…
