Snag the Red Hat 9 ISOs, via Cash or BitTorrent 655
Tectonic Rumblings
Every so often a new tool comes along that causes a shift from Bronze to Iron, that divides history into "before" and "after." The peer-to-peer world has certainly seen its share. Those who used 486s to encode and play MP3s remember it wasn't just abysmal modem speeds that kept people from casual trading, but the tiresome process of finding users and content; Napster freed us from that bondage, letting the computer do the heavy lifting and freeing people to do what they do best.
When the weaknesses began to show in Napster's overly centralized model, Gnutella stepped in with a distributed, decentralized network. Audiogalaxy gave us astounding variety (even the most obscure music could always be found sooner or later) and a rich sense of community that is still sorely missed. WinMX offered the ability to connect to multiple Napster-compatible networks; with the advent of multi-source downloading, Morpheus and similar programs allowed us to rise above the limitations of slow upstream (until it's hard now to find any P2P applications that don't use it); and EDonkey added the nice touch of being able to share files before they were done downloading.
So what's the next stage of P2P evolution?
Enter BitTorrent -- a "swarming, scatter and gather" file transfer protocol developed by Bram Cohen that's taking the net by storm. Even without a friendly, unified interface, BT's ability to scale in the face of overwhelming demand while minimizing the free rider problem ("leeching") has attracted a flood of new users. But as with any tool, understanding how and why it works will always make using it easier and more fun.
All technical references are taken from the BT server tutorial and the official documentation.
Let's Start with the Basics
BitTorrent is not a 'website' or a 'network', and strictly speaking is not even a program -- it's a protocol with a number of functional implementations.
Instead of jumping right into downloading, first we'll discuss how files are served. Most new BT users are familiar with going to a website and clicking on links to .torrent files, but this just provides a friendlier interface and isn't actually necessary. All you really need to serve is a public Internet machine. The "tracker" will "keep track" of who is connected and who has which pieces of the file(s) in question. Like any public Internet service, a static IP address and/or valid hostname will make it easier for people to connect to your tracker.
To start serving, you choose a file or directory to serve and run a program which generates a .torrent file. This contains a 'hash,' which serves as a checksum to ensure the file is the same on all systems, as well as the address of a tracker. A typical .torrent file is quite small, typically 5-50k in size.
The second step is to load the .torrent file into a BT client. The client asks you where to save the file, you point it at the existing and complete copy, it verifies that the file hash matches, says the download is done and sits there uploading when necessary until you cancel it.
Here's an animated graphic (.mng, currently viewable only in Mozilla) of a torrent transfer.
Getting Started
The official BT client is available for Win32, Mac OS X, as an unstable Debian package, and as Python source code.
Getting started is quite simple; the Windows installer asks no questions and provides no options, and the only behind-the-scenes addition is that Internet Explorer now launches BT when you click on links to .torrent files. (Mozilla users will need to edit Preferences, Navigator, Helper Applications and add the mime type "application/x-bittorrent", to be launched by the btdownloadprefetched executable.) You can also download .torrent files and load them locally without going through a website.
Once the .torrent has been invoked, the client will prompt you for a location to save the file to. The client then creates a file of the appropriate size containing all zeros, and connects to the tracker to get a starting list of some random subset of available peers (other users connected to the 'swarm'). BT then starts connecting to peers and downloading random chunks of the file, and begin uploading to other peers as soon as you have enough for it to bother.
Every time your client verifies another piece of the download, it tells the tracker it has a good copy of that piece. By directly utilizing each user's outgoing bandwidth, downloads can be generally be completed very quickly while minimizing the load on the original server, in effect turning the dreaded "Slashdot Effect" against itself -- the more who want to download, the more there are to upload. Sooner or later (usually sooner), the download is done, and the client continues to upload pieces to other users.
What's In It For Me?
Now your first instinct at this point might be to close the program, but you really ought to leave it open as long as possible afterward, to help seed the file into the network. But this is really a social and cultural issue which can't necessarily be addressed through technical measures; BT can enforce fairness during the transfer with its algorithms, but no software can force the user to keep the client open. Many tracker owners keep a close eye on such things, and will generally ban repeat offenders. In any event, "giving back" your bandwidth has never been easier, even for users behind firewalls or NAT (although as always, being able to avoid or go through these will make the transfers more efficient).
Alternative Clients and Other Tools
That said, there are perfectly valid reasons to want some control over the amount of bandwidth a P2P application uses, and an experimental, unofficial client (Win32, Python source) has been created to provide a friendly interface for this. BT will automatically adjust your download speed appropriately if you set a slower upload speed, but it's still an invaluable tool for some cable and DSL users whose downloads will choke and abort if they use too much upstream, or for anyone with limited upstream who wants to reserve some of it for other uses.
Currently, both the official and experimental GUI clients use a separate window for each transfer. BT++ (Win32, Python source) has made an initial attempt at combining all transfers into one window, as well as offering some other enhancements, but users report mixed results, with some saying "it works for me" and others that it's buggy to the point of unusable; still, it's one to keep an eye on. (Caveat: BT++ provides an option to automatically stop uploading when the download is completed. I believe this deliberately encourages people to do so even if there is no real need to do so, and would advise anyone using BT++ to refrain from using this option; it's unnecessary, detrimental to the BT networks, and may lead to your IP being banned as described above.)
TorrentSpy (Win32) is another useful tool that shows various statistics about your transfers, including which files of a multi-file torrent are complete. It's not meant to replace a downloading client, but to complement it.
I should add that the speed and time-to-completion numbers may not be wholly accurate, and will typically fluctuate wildly to some extent during a transfer. (After all, do you believe Windows when it tells you how long it will take to copy a file?) The "percentage completed" at least is accurate, and you may be able to get more accurate information using TorrentSpy. A new version of BT has just been released (3.2) and its reported changes include "more even and consistent download rates".
A Few Miscellaneous Points
It's quite possible to generate .torrents for files you want to serve and then advertise them on someone else's tracker. Since anyone can run a tracker, BT is more like IRC, Usenet or Direct Connect than something like Kazaa. Like Freenet, it works best if the content is highly in demand; it's also more effective on recently released stuff. One highly recommeded website is Bstark. It doesn't provide .torrents for anyone to download, but functions as a "metatracker", that is, a tracker that keeps track of trackers. If you're a statistics geek, the graphs are a lot of fun, and even for the average user it's a simple way to check what files are most in demand and most in need of someone to serve them. This is even more effective when you combine it with an alternate means of communication such as IRC or email, making it easy for users to check supply and meet demand. The .torrent file can also be distributed by any means, be it a website, IRC channel, email attachments or perhaps carrier pigeon.
Conclusion
With the 'entertainment industry' finally focusing their attention on IRC, the cantankerous and difficult granddaddy of Internet file sharing, BitTorrent has found a niche and filled it admirably. The author understandably wishes to focus upon using BT in a legal manner. As with any new invention, "the street finds its own use for technology," and BitTorrent will undoubtedly continue to be rapidly adopted for both licit and illicit use.
Given the decentralized nature of BT networks and the rapid development of new tools, it's only a matter of time before someone writes a GUI wrapper for an IRC client, web browser and all-in-one BitTorrent interface. After all, Napster did it, as do most other mainstream P2P apps like Kazaa. Like Direct Connect with its 'hubs,' there will always be multiple BT servers available, and a unified interface would not only make it easier for users to find and download content, but free them to focus on forming the social and cultural networks that are also needed. A website typically uses far too much CPU and bandwidth to handle popular traffic, but a BT tracker uses minimal bandwidth by itself. Perhaps the next-generation clients will try to automatically locate trackers, or help the user find and serve older content as well as new releases.
The late great Audiogalaxy had many strengths, but one of its most fundamental was the sense of community it encouraged. BitTorrent wisely fills a narrow set of technical requirements, leaving a great deal to human need and will. The ad hoc arrangements and customs that have so far sprouted as expressions of the will to fill these needs are often chaotic and messy -- but that's human action for you.
YES! (Score:4, Insightful)
Tell RedHat to screw off! Circumvent the subscription policy with P2P!
Is that a bullethole in your foot?
How about some ethics ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Correct me if I've got the facts wrong. But it sounds to me like a week long wait is not really long, and that this announcement in Slashdot is not really ethical ...
Nice to see well written pieces on /. (Score:5, Insightful)
Otherwise I'm glad to see the P2P community keeping pace (or should I say, one step ahead of) with the best in file serving. I'm not sure that RedHat would be pleased about it, but it was bound to happen that the ISOs would be released back to the community in record time regardless of paid subscriptions. In the end, I think they'll find it difficult to release anything without the inevitable leaks. This seems to hold true for Microsoft as well, as they contend with leak after leak of their beta and developer images. Information wants to be free!!
What the? (Score:5, Insightful)
---rhad
Subscriber costs (Score:5, Insightful)
Rus
Re:YES! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:1, Insightful)
While I am not familiar with this particular situation, I would expect that most of their money comes from selling their software in boxes. You can't download those nice big manuals with BitTorrent or FTP.
And by the way, if a week-long wait is not so long, then why would this decrease the value of the subscriptions?
Re:What the? (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah bit torrent, yeah ISO out...blah blah blah (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Subscriber costs (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks in advance to mods for extra tasty troll points.
Also, notice I said most not all, I know there are lots of people that believe in open source.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Once you have the bits they are yours to do with as you please.
I'll bet that RedHat is offering the pre-access to the bits for the subscribers so that they can actually get the bits before thier servers are /.ed from the unwashed masses.
And I would bet that RedHat is happy to off-load the downloading to something like BT. It just makes thier bandwidth usage go down, and most likley the people sharing the bits were not going to buy support anyway.
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't bother to say that the people who paid the $60, or whatever fee, paid for the right to get it early. That is just silly. They paid for the service they are getting from RedHat, as well as the ability to D/L the ISO from RedHat.
Personally, RedHat can say 'bye' to me. I am going back to Gentoo. We don't need no stinkin' surveys.
-J
Re:YES! (Score:5, Insightful)
Strange that people seem to be so religious about all the details of the GPL, except when it might hurt RedHat, in which case it's okay for them to sell it like proprietary software.
Hopefully, it is faster... (Score:5, Insightful)
I am a Red Hat subscriber and I am pushing a measly 14 kb/sec to download three 600+ MB ISOs. I'm on ISO #1 with 9 hours to go!
So what exactly is the advantage of getting the distro a week ahead of everyone else when the servers for "subscriber use" are so overloaded it will take me a week to download it!?!
Re:What the? (Score:3, Insightful)
Mixed Feelings (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, this is a massive leak for RedHat... if BitTorrent can always be relied upon to get the ISOs the day they're released to subscribers, then there is no incentive to become a RedHat subscriber... and thus RedHat loses money.
In the future, it would be nice if BitTorrent users could wait until after the distro is released to the public before mirroring it... Yeah, then companies like RedHat still get their 1 week advance for subscribers, AND they get to not have their servers flooded on public release day.
*sigh*... I better go buy a RH9 boxed set, I feel all dirty now.
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:5, Insightful)
From one hand, using p2p networks to download latest RedHat's ISOs is going against supporing a Good(tm) company.
On the other hand, paying RedHat 60$ a year, and then going and downloading latest ISOs from p2p actually helps RedHat to save some bandwidth for those customers who complain too much. This might be actually helping RedHat in terms of partially paying their bills using the resources of those p2p users. :)
The company I work for has a bunch of subscriptions to RHN, both Basic and Enterprise, but we are still getting 1-2KB/s download speeds currently. P2p might improve our satisfaction on the subject though. :)
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is good for Red Hat. There are some obvious PR benefits to it, of course.... but I think it amounts to R&D they'll eventually capitalize on.
RHATs central servers -- not just for isos but also for updates -- are a vulnerability; a single point of failure six different ways from tuesday. (There's even another post in this
Not nearly all, but a big chunk of the vulnerabilities can be fixed with P2P distribution. RHAT's bigger customers can be organized to help each other that way. When, for example, security emergency response times become critical, P2P will be a big boon.
If, suddenly, all distribution of RHAT software happened P2P -- subscriptions would still have value, and that value will grow over time. Immediately, it would have value as a source of secure hashes, delivered over multiple channels. Of course it would retain its support values -- and my hope/prediction is that in the future, Red Hat Network will increase in the degree to which it is a low-walled garden "community (of customers) website": tightening and enriching the feedback loop between customers and programmers.
-t
Re:I thought you were right on... (Score:5, Insightful)
I already pony up the 60 per year anyway, have for two years. Its a good service they provide, well worth the money.
As to them making money, once again what I see is giving a little more to those of us that give a little more to them. I didn't like the way they marketed it, but the fact is they give alot more bandwidth to people who have NEVER given them a dime than anyone else. The GPL requires you make the source available. They COULD put all their files on a 64k throttle except for subscribers, and meet the requirements of the GPL. But they don't.
I personally hope they do make some money, get back in the black, and gain some market share. Linux is never going to become mainstream without companies like Redhat who have somewhat viable business plans. I WANT them to be here 10 years from now, because I like their products.
Reminds of the gag: How do you make a profit by giving stuff away?
VOLUME!
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Doesn't GPL allow charging for distribution? Isn't that what RedHat is doing, charing for their distribution?
Well you obviously don't (Score:2, Insightful)
And anyhow, RH 9 actually does include something much more than "a little gloss" - NPTL (warning - link is to a pdf) [redhat.com]
Now if you've ever tried to debug a core file of a multi-threaded app, or dealt with signal propagation with the old... aw, shucks never mind, but take my word for it, NPTL - woot woot
Oh, woot woot BT too by the looks of things...
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't want to wait a week for all that convenience? Download all their GPL'd source and build it yourself.
OR let's just rename it the GGGPL (gimme gimme gimme public liscense)
Re:YES! (Score:3, Insightful)
For windows users this way to download an er.. "unnoficial" way to obtain the official redhat would be as running kazaa, edonkey, or similar, in a legal way, to get a software that should be free but they feel as they should be paying for.
That is the key for linux adoption, not giving distributions as something so free to windows users, but show them in the same way that pirated software, this will give value to it and after all the effort getting it, they will appreciate the software more, will try actually to install it, and maybe they will adopt it as their official OS.
Re:Pretty cool! (Score:4, Insightful)
Redhat was giving me 8.7kB/s down before I found this article.
Re:Mixed Feelings (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:How about some ethics ? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's no different for a week, then after it's very different.
Jokes aside, if you charge for a week, you're charging for the early access service. If you charge indefinitely, you're charging for the product. Two very different things. In my state they'd be taxed differently, so the state calls them different.
BitTorrent is a great tool which RedHat can use to get their bandwidth costs under control so they can focus on their core business, whatever that may be.
I think part of their business may be charging for early access to software downloads.
Everyone says "OpenSource is great, no need for charging for software, charge for services". Then RedHat comes out with a value add service - you can download something a bit early before being stuck in a queue, and now everyone says "no, thats not cool, we have to wait a whole WEEK."
As far as using BitTorrent to save them bandwidth, there's nothing stopping you from using BitTorrent in a week either. The same benefits can be had a week from now without subverting a RedHat revenue stream.
Personally, if I had a business, I'd still probably download from Redhat servers anyway, just to avoid possible trojans.
Re:YES! (Score:4, Insightful)
It *isn't* a IE browser plugin as many folks have claimed. The installer simply installs the program like any other program, and then adds the correct mime-type and windows extension handler to IE. THAT'S IT. Writing an installer that makes it easy to install in Windows is a good thing, since doing so adds large group of users to the user base.
All the tools to setup torrented downloads work best in Linux. I use BitTorrent in Linux all the time and it runs just like any other program. It's very nice.
Installing almost any program like this that works well with mozilla or phoenix is impossible. Tried to install the Flash plugin? It sucks rocks. Bram and the BT crew can't be held responsible for the fact that creating a slick interface to Linux browsers is like trying to keep 10 polygamous wives happy. Nothing works the same way twice.
what changes? (Score:2, Insightful)
What is different about RedHat 9.0 that is applicable to me?
I'm just curious if I should bother with upgrading or not - I would guess no since I can just download any one particular thing that I want/need.
The one thing that I can think of justifying it would be that I'd like a working lm_sensors. The existing lm_sensors that it came with for me didn't have anything for my motherboard (epox 8kmm+). I'll admit it - I tried installing lm_sensors on my own and couldn't do it successfully (so much for "following the instructions").
So were there some way that was RetardEasy to get that in... ie "upgrading" - then I'd go for it.
Otherwise, it is just another big number jump in a short period of time that I'm not sure has any real bearing on me - yet leaves me curiously watching all those about me rush to get it.. wondering... why?
Re:YES! (Score:3, Insightful)
But you are probably thinking of the Office and Multimedia Applications CD [redhat.com] which is not part of Red Hat Linux 9, but rather an add-on 7th or 8th disk included with Red hat Linux 9 Professional and you will find that the licensing on all of that software includes specific language that allows for duplication of the Red Hat Linux 9 Professional ISOs. These packages are also not required (in fact, I don't even think they're referenced) by the base installation of the software.
What I don't understand is how there can be such wild misinformation as there has been about Red Hat.
This move has the obvious intent of invoking one of the more useful properties of the Internet: it interprets restraint (I'm generalizing the concept of censorship, which is usually what is cited in this particular quote) as damage and routes around it. Red Hat was spending more and more money per release on providing ISO downloads. What to do? Stop providing a download for the ISOs and let the community create a better solution. If they didn't think the community would do so, they certainly would not be in the free software business (I say free software only because Red Hat as a company pre-dates other terms for this business model, not be cause "open source" would not have applied equally well).
Re:Caveat Downloader! (Score:3, Insightful)
On the other hand, the torrent initiator may have had a corrupt image to work with. It can happen.
In any case, BitTorrent uses the SHA1 secure hash algorithm, which is comparable to MD5, to verify downloads. So long as the
Re:I thought you were right on... (Score:3, Insightful)
Also note that the number of systems running it are low, too, even tho it is an exceptional OS. I have no prob with them distributing it this way, but it IS part of the reason I don't use openBSD, even tho I KNOW its better for some tasks (pure web servers, for instance).
I cut my teeth on Redhat (4.2) because I could get it free, and then when I needed service, I didn't mind paying for it. Like all distros, it has weaknesses and strengths. Its not that RH is better, its that they made it easy for me to get used to it, and eventually, prefer it. Oh, and I have messed with mandrake, solaris, lindows (really), and slackware (ug).
While there is nothing WRONG with distributing an OS like this, it is not conducive to winning over the largest possible customer base, which is what Redhat is trying to do. Keep in mind, BSD is a very different animal anyway. BSD advocates tend to be more "purist" while Redhat tends to be more capital driven. Takes all kinds.
Re:I thought you were right on... (Score:2, Insightful)
Quibble: There's still one left (Score:3, Insightful)
Check out the list of packages included with Red Hat Linux 9. You'll find exactly zero non-free software.
Only because you brought the subject up:
"pine 4.44 A commonly used, MIME compliant mail and news reader." This code is source-available, but licensed under proprietary terms (no right to fork).
In pointing out this inclusion of the proprietary pine/pico/pilot package, I intend no criticism of Red Hat Software, Inc., which does it for perfectly understandable reason, given the pine MUA's wide appeal and lack of an open-source replacement acceptable to that customer base that doesn't suffer the same copyright encumbrance (as MANA does). Chris Allegretta's "nano" has nicely eliminated the pico problem, but ditching pine itself without seriously ticking off a fair number of people remains difficult.
When I saw that Red Hat had (by the 8.0 release) reduced the number of proprietary packages to just this one -- having pushed the envelope in jettisoning the old proprietary Java packages, ditched Navigator/Communicator in favour of Mozilla and Acrobat Reader in favour of xpdf, and actually helped write a replacement for xv -- I was (and remain) quite impressed. They've shown impressive leadership, in this area.
But it remains a (small) factual error to claim that the distribution is 100% free / open-source software.
Rick Moen
rick@linuxmafia.com
Re:Please post the right checksums (Score:3, Insightful)
Or, failing that, mount the CDs using loopback, and then check the signature. Something like this:
mount -o loop shrike-i386-disc3.iso /mnt/cdrom /mnt/cdrom/RedHat/RPMS/*.rpm
rpm --checksig
You'll need to have downloaded the RedHat public key, which you can get from "pub/redhat/linux/8.0/en/os/i386/RPM-GPG-KEY" of your favourite RedHat mirror, and then import with a command like:
rpm --import RPM-GPG-KEY