[p2p-hackers] Error correcting codes to prevent failure in BitTorrent like systems?

[coderman]

On 12/4/05, Nick Johnson <arachnid at notdot.net> wrote:
> Systems like BitTorrent have a rather annoying failure mode - the last
> 'seed' goes offline while there are still several 'peers' (without the
> complete file) online.

any system which makes a partial resource available has this problem,
even one using error correcting codes (seed goes offline before
requisite X of coded blocks are sent).


> However, what if [.. doing stuff to mix data ..], you
> can reduce the chance of the last departing seed ensuring nobody can
> complete the file.

no; you've just made it less likely that the end of the file will
always be the part missing if a peer terminates distribution
prematurely.