4 ms·

Me: What is DHT? Also Me: Distributed hash table. Me: Thanks. Also Me: You're welcome, but don't be too impressed. I googled it.

• jiofj 3y ago
  DHT is a protocol that allows peers to exchange data about torrents and peers; you can download the contents of a torrent by its hash instead of having to download a .torrent file and connect to a server to find peers. Kademlia is similar for eMule, only that it also allows search.
  • devoutsalsa 3y ago
    > you can download the contents of a torrent by its hash How are hash collisions resolved? I'd hate to think I'm downloading my favorite TV show & find that I've downloaded something that makes ma attract the attention of law enforcement.
    • grotorea 3y ago
      Aren't hash collisions supposed to be extremely unlikely in general?
      • devoutsalsa 3y ago
        Yes, but I don't want to explain to the FBI I was really trying to download a nature documentary.
    • rakoo 3y ago
      It's sha1, collisions are unrealistic
      • devoutsalsa 3y ago
        Thanks, that’s the answer was looking for.
  • xorcist 3y ago
    Kademlia, being a permissionless distributed search protocol, is also heavily polluted. Both by malware and people set out to make piracy harder. It's a hard problem.
    • jiofj 3y ago
      Not my experience.
  • throwawaymobule 3y ago
    I love that most clients support just pasting the infohash into the 'add url' field. Saved me a few times on shady-looking sites that demanded an account or something before showing a download link, but still listed the infohash on the page. Useful too when pasting it into a search engine actually gave results.