Gnutella protocol and hostcaches
 

Hi,

i've got a question about the "hostcaches".
It's said Gnutella is real peer tp peer and users don't have to log in to central server.
But what's about the hostcaches ? aren't they central server ?
- or what about the hosts "connect1.gnutellanet.com:6346" and so on ?

Hope someone can answer these questions.
Thanks in advance,
daniel

Hi!
The Problem is, your client has to know at least one IP of an other client, so it can log into the Gnutella-Net!

There are (at least) two ways:

Hostchacher
A Hostcacher collects IPs from Clients, and send them to your client at startup!

A List of IPs
Some Clients generate a list of known IPs, and uses them on startup

Some clients do both!

Hope it helps.
(If there is somethong wrong, Moak will shurly correct it!)
:D

Re: Gnutella protocol and hostcaches
 

Host caches are merely "helpers" - Gnutella doesn't rely on them nor are they part of the Gnutella protocol. For example, if no host caches existed, someone could e-mail you an IP, or it could be posted on a newsgroup or IRC channel, and you're in business.

But since sending out an IP like that is usually impractical for most users (think of newer Internet users), they have host caches to help them out.

-- Mike

Hey thanks a lot !!

I think everything is clear now.... but i'll be back if there are new questions ;-)

Anyway: Does anybody know where i can find more information about Gnutella and especially about the protocoll.

Thanks
Daniel

Try this:
http://www.gnutellaforums.com/forumd...?s=&forumid=42
http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showth...&threadid=4638

Have fun :)

If your client has a local hostlist of clients IP addresses he received messages from (AFAIK all common clients have one) you usually need the hostcache only the first time you connect to the network. When the hostlist is saved and you restart the client you are able to join the network by trying to connect to clients in your hostlist ... that always works fine ...