I'm interested in figuring out how the Gnutella servents actually work (interacting with each other). I've surfed through a zillion pages (well, not exactly...) and I still can't quite grasp the ideas. I'm hoping someone can shed some light.

1. TCP/IP communication occurs between all the servents?

2. Is there a high occurence or chance of cyclic discovery or cyclic searches? (ie. I am new user A, and I connect to existing Gnutella servent B who is already connected to C and D. So i connect to B and discover C and D and they point me back at B)

3. How does the whole firewall interaction work? A sends a pull request to B (B is behind a firewall). It fails so A sends a push request to B. How does this request GET to B? Through the open ports (the message is disguised) or through an alternate means (A sends a request to C who somehow sends it to B)?

4. HTTP requests only occur for file requests and the rest (searches/discoveries) are done by TCP/IP?

These are the main issues I'm trying to resolve... thanks for ALL your help! (If these questions make no sense... please bare with me)

stan