This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.
A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. A system, surrounded and influenced by its environment, is described by its boundaries, structure and purpose and is expressed in its functioning. Systems are the subjects of study of systems theory and other systems sciences. Systems have several common properties and characteristics, including structure, function(s), behavior and interconnectivity.
Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. This forms a peer-to-peer network of nodes. Peers make a portion of their resources, such as processing power, disk storage or network bandwidth, directly available to other network participants, without the need for central coordination by servers or stable hosts.
An overlay network is a computer network that is layered on top of another network. Nodes in the overlay network can be thought of as being connected by virtual or logical links, each of which corresponds to a path, perhaps through many physical links, in the underlying network. For example, distributed systems such as peer-to-peer networks and client–server applications are overlay networks because their nodes run on top of the Internet.
The impact of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks on the Internet landscape is undisputed. It has led to a series of new applications, e.g., as part of the so-called Web 2.0. The shift from the classical clie
EPFL2008
, , ,
Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks are used worldwide for many applications such as file sharing or news servers. There are many different implementations available, each with its pros and cons. In this pape
2008
, , ,
The idea of collecting and combining large public data sets and services became more and more popular. The special characteristics of such systems and the requirements of the participants demand for s