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419 lines
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<li class="first"><a href="/">Home</a></li>
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<div id="orange"></div>
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<div id="logo"></div>
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</div>
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<div id="main">
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<h1 class="title">BitTorrent extension for DHT RSS feeds</h1>
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<table class="docinfo" frame="void" rules="none">
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<col class="docinfo-name" />
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<col class="docinfo-content" />
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<tbody valign="top">
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<tr><th class="docinfo-name">Author:</th>
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<td>Arvid Norberg, <a class="last reference external" href="mailto:arvid@rasterbar.com">arvid@rasterbar.com</a></td></tr>
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<tr><th class="docinfo-name">Version:</th>
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<td>1.0.0</td></tr>
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</tbody>
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</table>
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<div class="contents topic" id="table-of-contents">
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<p class="topic-title first">Table of contents</p>
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<ul class="simple">
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#terminology" id="id1">terminology</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#linked-lists" id="id2">linked lists</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#skip-lists" id="id3">skip lists</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#list-head" id="id4">list-head</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#messages" id="id5">messages</a><ul>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#requesting-items" id="id6">requesting items</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#request-item-response" id="id7">request item response</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#announcing-items" id="id8">announcing items</a></li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#re-announcing" id="id9">re-announcing</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#timeouts" id="id10">timeouts</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#rss-feeds" id="id11">RSS feeds</a><ul>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#example" id="id12">example</a></li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#rss-feed-uri-scheme" id="id13">RSS feed URI scheme</a></li>
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<li><a class="reference internal" href="#rationale" id="id14">rationale</a></li>
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</ul>
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</div>
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<p>This is a proposal for an extension to the BitTorrent DHT to allow
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for decentralized RSS feed like functionality.</p>
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<p>The intention is to allow the creation of repositories of torrents
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where only a single identity has the authority to add new content. For
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this repository to be robust against network failures and resilient
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to attacks at the source.</p>
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<p>The target ID under which the repository is stored in the DHT, is the
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SHA-1 hash of a feed name and the 512 bit public key. This private key
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in this pair MUST be used to sign every item stored in the repository.
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Every message that contain signed items MUST also include this key, to
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allow the receiver to verify the key itself against the target ID as well
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as the validity of the signatures of the items. Every recipient of a
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message with feed items in it MUST verify both the validity of the public
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key against the target ID it is stored under, as well as the validity of
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the signatures of each individual item.</p>
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<p>As with normal DHT announces, the write-token mechanism is used to
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prevent IP spoof attacks.</p>
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<p>There are two new proposed messages, <tt class="docutils literal">announce_item</tt> and <tt class="docutils literal">get_item</tt>.
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Every valid item that is announced, should be stored.</p>
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<div class="section" id="terminology">
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<h1>terminology</h1>
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<p>In this document, a <em>storage node</em> refers to the node in the DHT to which
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an item is being announce. A <em>subscribing node</em> refers to a node which
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makes look ups in the DHT to find the storage nodes, to request items
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from them.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="linked-lists">
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<h1>linked lists</h1>
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<p>Items are chained together in a geneal singly linked list. A linked
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list does not necessarily contain RSS items, and no RSS related items
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are mandatory. However, RSS items will be used as examples in this BEP:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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key = SHA1(name + key)
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+---------+
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| head | key = SHA1(bencode(item))
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| +---------+ +---------+
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| | next |-------->| item | key = SHA1(bencode(item))
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| | key | | +---------+ +---------+
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| | name | | | next |------->| item |
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| | seq | | | key | | +---------+
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| | ... | | | ... | | | next |--->0
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| +---------+ | +---------+ | | key |
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| sig | | sig | | | ... |
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+---------+ +---------+ | +---------+
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| sig |
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+---------+
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</pre>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> pointer is at least 20 byte ID in the DHT key space pointing to where the next
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item in the list is announced. The list is terminated with an ID of all zeroes.</p>
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<p>The ID an items is announced to is determined by the SHA1 hash of the bencoded representation
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of the item iteself. This contains all fields in the item, except the signature.
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The only mandatory fields in an item are <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt>, <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt> and <tt class="docutils literal">sig</tt>.</p>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt> field MUST match the public key of the list head node. The <tt class="docutils literal">sig</tt> field
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MUST be the signature of the bencoded representation of <tt class="docutils literal">item</tt> or <tt class="docutils literal">head</tt> (whichever
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is included in the message).</p>
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<p>All subscribers MUST verify that the item is announced under the correct DHT key
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and MUST verify the signature is valid and MUST verify the public key is the same
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as the list-head. If a node fails any of these checks, it must be ignored and the
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chain of items considered terminated.</p>
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<p>Each item holds a bencoded dictionary with arbitrary keys, except two mandatory keys:
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<tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> and <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt>. The signature <tt class="docutils literal">sig</tt> is transferred outside of this dictionary
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and is the signature of all of it. An implementation should stora any arbitrary keys that
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are announced to an item, within reasonable restriction such as nesting, size and numeric
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range of integers.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="skip-lists">
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<h1>skip lists</h1>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> key stored in the list head and the items is a string of at least length
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20 bytes, it may be any length divisible by 20. Each 20 bytes are the ID of the next
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item in the list, the item 2 hops away, 4 hops away, 8 hops away, and so on. For
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simplicity, only the first ID (1 hop) in the <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> field is illustrated above.</p>
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<p>A publisher of an item SHOULD include as many IDs in the <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> field as the remaining
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size of the list warrants, within reason.</p>
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<p>These skip lists allow for parallelized lookups of items and also makes it more efficient
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to search for specific items. It also mitigates breaking lists missing some items.</p>
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<p>Figure of the skip list in the first list item:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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n Item0 Item1 Item2 Item3 Item4 Item5 Item6 Item7 Item8 Item9 Item10
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0 O----->
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20 O------------>
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40 O-------------------------->
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60 O------------------------------------------------------>
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</pre>
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<p><em>n</em> refers to the byte offset into the <tt class="docutils literal">next</tt> field.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="list-head">
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<h1>list-head</h1>
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<p>The list head item is special in that it can be updated, without changing its
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DHT key. This is required to prepend new items to the linked list. To authenticate
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that only the original publisher can update the head, the whole linked list head
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is signed. In order to avoid a malicious node to overwrite the list head with an old
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version, the sequence number <tt class="docutils literal">seq</tt> must be monotonically increasing for each update,
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and a node hosting the list node MUST not downgrade a list head from a higher sequence
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number to a lower one, only upgrade.</p>
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<p>The list head's DHT key (which it is announced to) MUST be the SHA1 hash of the name
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(<tt class="docutils literal">n</tt>) and <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt> fields concatenated.</p>
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<p>Any node MUST reject any list head which is announced under any other ID.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="messages">
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<h1>messages</h1>
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<p>These are the messages to deal with linked lists.</p>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">id</tt> field in these messages has the same semantics as the standard DHT messages,
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i.e. the node ID of the node sending the message, to maintain the structure of the DHT
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network.</p>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">token</tt> field also has the same semantics as the standard DHT message <tt class="docutils literal">get_peers</tt>
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and <tt class="docutils literal">announce_peer</tt>, when requesting an item and to write an item respectively.</p>
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<p><tt class="docutils literal">nodes</tt> and <tt class="docutils literal">nodes6</tt> has the same semantics as in its <tt class="docutils literal">get_peers</tt> response.</p>
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<div class="section" id="requesting-items">
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<h2>requesting items</h2>
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<p>This message can be used to request both a list head and a list item. When requesting
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a list head, the <tt class="docutils literal">n</tt> (name) field MUST be specified. When requesting a list item the
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<tt class="docutils literal">n</tt> field is not required.</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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{
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"a":
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{
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"id": <em><20 byte ID of sending node></em>,
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"key": <em><64 byte public curve25519 key for this list></em>,
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"n": <em><list name></em>
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"target": <em><target-id for 'head' or 'item'></em>
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},
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"q": "get_item",
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"t": <em><transaction-id></em>,
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"y": "q",
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}
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</pre>
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<p>When requesting a list-head the <tt class="docutils literal">target</tt> MUST always be SHA-1(<em>feed_name</em> + <em>public_key</em>).
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<tt class="docutils literal">target</tt> is the target node ID the item was written to.</p>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">n</tt> field is the name of the list. If specified, It MUST be UTF-8 encoded string
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and it MUST match the name of the feed in the receiving node.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="request-item-response">
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<h2>request item response</h2>
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<p>This is the format of a response of a list head:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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{
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"r":
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{
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"head":
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{
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"key": <em><64 byte public curve25519 key for this list></em>,
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"next": <em><20 bytes item ID></em>,
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"n": <em><name of the linked list></em>,
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"seq": <em><monotonically increasing sequence number></em>
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},
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"sig": <em><curve25519 signature of 'head' entry (in bencoded form)></em>,
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"id": <em><20 byte id of sending node></em>,
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"token": <em><write-token></em>,
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"nodes": <em><n * compact IPv4-port pair></em>,
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"nodes6": <em><n * compact IPv6-port pair></em>
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},
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"t": <em><transaction-id></em>,
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"y": "r",
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}
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</pre>
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<p>This is the format of a response of a list item:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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{
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"r":
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{
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"item":
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{
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"key": <em><64 byte public curve25519 key for this list></em>,
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"next": <em><20 bytes item ID></em>,
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...
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},
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"sig": <em><curve25519 signature of 'item' entry (in bencoded form)></em>,
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"id": <em><20 byte id of sending node></em>,
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"token": <em><write-token></em>,
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"nodes": <em><n * compact IPv4-port pair></em>,
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"nodes6": <em><n * compact IPv6-port pair></em>
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},
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"t": <em><transaction-id></em>,
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"y": "r",
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}
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</pre>
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<p>A client receiving a <tt class="docutils literal">get_item</tt> response MUST verify the signature in the <tt class="docutils literal">sig</tt>
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field against the bencoded representation of the <tt class="docutils literal">item</tt> field, using the <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt> as
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the public key. The <tt class="docutils literal">key</tt> MUST match the public key of the feed.</p>
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<p>The <tt class="docutils literal">item</tt> dictionary MAY contain arbitrary keys, and all keys MUST be stored for
|
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items.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="announcing-items">
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<h2>announcing items</h2>
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<p>The message format for announcing a list head:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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{
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"a":
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{
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"head":
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{
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"key": <em><64 byte public curve25519 key for this list></em>,
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"next": <em><20 bytes item ID></em>,
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"n": <em><name of the linked list></em>,
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"seq": <em><monotonically increasing sequence number></em>
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},
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"sig": <em><curve25519 signature of 'head' entry (in bencoded form)></em>,
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"id": <em><20 byte node-id of origin node></em>,
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"target": <em><target-id as derived from public key and name></em>,
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"token": <em><write-token as obtained by previous request></em>
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},
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"y": "q",
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"q": "announce_item",
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"t": <em><transaction-id></em>
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}
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</pre>
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<p>The message format for announcing a list item:</p>
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<pre class="literal-block">
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{
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"a":
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{
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"item":
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{
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"key": <em><64 byte public curve25519 key for this list></em>,
|
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"next": <em><20 bytes item ID></em>,
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...
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},
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"sig": <em><curve25519 signature of 'item' entry (in bencoded form)></em>,
|
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"id": <em><20 byte node-id of origin node></em>,
|
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"target": <em><target-id as derived from item dict></em>,
|
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"token": <em><write-token as obtained by previous request></em>
|
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},
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"y": "q",
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"q": "announce_item",
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"t": <em><transaction-id></em>
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}
|
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</pre>
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<p>A storage node MAY reject items and heads whose bencoded representation is
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greater than 1024 bytes.</p>
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</div>
|
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="re-announcing">
|
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<h1>re-announcing</h1>
|
|
<p>In order to keep feeds alive, subscriber nodes SHOULD help out in announcing
|
|
items they have downloaded to the DHT.</p>
|
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<p>Every subscriber node SHOULD store items in long term storage, across sessions,
|
|
in order to keep items alive for as long as possible, with as few sources as possible.</p>
|
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<p>Subscribers to a feed SHOULD also announce items that they know of, to the feed.
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Since a feed may have many subscribers and many items, subscribers should re-announce
|
|
items according to the following algorithm.</p>
|
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<pre class="literal-block">
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1. pick one random item (<em>i</em>) from the local repository (except
|
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items already announced this round)
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2. If all items in the local repository have been announced
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2.1 terminate
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3. look up item <em>i</em> in the DHT
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4. If fewer than 8 nodes returned the item
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4.1 announce <em>i</em> to the DHT
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4.2 goto 1
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</pre>
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<p>This ensures a balanced load on the DHT while still keeping items alive</p>
|
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</div>
|
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<div class="section" id="timeouts">
|
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<h1>timeouts</h1>
|
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<p>Items SHOULD be announced to the DHT every 30 minutes. A storage node MAY time
|
|
out an item after 60 minutes of no one announcing it.</p>
|
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<p>A storing node MAY extend the timeout when it receives a request for it. Since
|
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items are immutable, the data doesn't go stale. Therefore it doesn't matter if
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the storing node no longer is in the set of the 8 closest nodes.</p>
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</div>
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<div class="section" id="rss-feeds">
|
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<h1>RSS feeds</h1>
|
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<p>For RSS feeds, following keys are mandatory in the list item's <tt class="docutils literal">item</tt> dictionary.</p>
|
|
<dl class="docutils">
|
|
<dt>ih</dt>
|
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<dd>The torrent's info hash</dd>
|
|
<dt>size</dt>
|
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<dd>The size (in bytes) of all files the torrent</dd>
|
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<dt>n</dt>
|
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<dd>name of the torrent</dd>
|
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</dl>
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<div class="section" id="example">
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<h2>example</h2>
|
|
<p>This is an example of an <tt class="docutils literal">announce_item</tt> message:</p>
|
|
<pre class="literal-block">
|
|
{
|
|
"a":
|
|
{
|
|
"item":
|
|
{
|
|
"key": "6bc1de5443d1a7c536cdf69433ac4a7163d3c63e2f9c92d
|
|
78f6011cf63dbcd5b638bbc2119cdad0c57e4c61bc69ba5e2c08
|
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b918c2db8d1848cf514bd9958d307",
|
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"info-hash": "7ea94c240691311dc0916a2a91eb7c3db2c6f3e4",
|
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"size": 24315329,
|
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"n": "my stuff",
|
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"next": "c68f29156404e8e0aas8761ef5236bcagf7f8f2e"
|
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}
|
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"sig": <em><signature></em>
|
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"id": "b46989156404e8e0acdb751ef553b210ef77822e",
|
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"target": "b4692ef0005639e86d7165bf378474107bf3a762"
|
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"token": "23ba"
|
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},
|
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"y": "q",
|
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"q": "announce_item",
|
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"t": "a421"
|
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}
|
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</pre>
|
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<p>Strings are printed in hex for printability, but actual encoding is binary.</p>
|
|
<p>Note that <tt class="docutils literal">target</tt> is in fact SHA1 hash of the same data the signature <tt class="docutils literal">sig</tt>
|
|
is the signature of, i.e.:</p>
|
|
<pre class="literal-block">
|
|
d9:info-hash20:7ea94c240691311dc0916a2a91eb7c3db2c6f3e43:key64:6bc1de5443d1
|
|
a7c536cdf69433ac4a7163d3c63e2f9c92d78f6011cf63dbcd5b638bbc2119cdad0c57e4c61
|
|
bc69ba5e2c08b918c2db8d1848cf514bd9958d3071:n8:my stuff4:next20:c68f29156404
|
|
e8e0aas8761ef5236bcagf7f8f2e4:sizei24315329ee
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>(note that binary data is printed as hex)</p>
|
|
</div>
|
|
</div>
|
|
<div class="section" id="rss-feed-uri-scheme">
|
|
<h1>RSS feed URI scheme</h1>
|
|
<p>The proposed URI scheme for DHT feeds is:</p>
|
|
<pre class="literal-block">
|
|
magnet:?xt=btfd:<em><base16-curve25519-public-key></em> &dn= <em><feed name></em>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>Note that a difference from regular torrent magnet links is the <strong>btfd</strong>
|
|
versus <strong>btih</strong> used in regular magnet links to torrents.</p>
|
|
<p>The <em>feed name</em> is mandatory since it is used in the request and when
|
|
calculating the target ID.</p>
|
|
</div>
|
|
<div class="section" id="rationale">
|
|
<h1>rationale</h1>
|
|
<p>The reason to use <a class="reference external" href="http://cr.yp.to/ecdh.html">curve25519</a> instead of, for instance, RSA is compactness. According to
|
|
<a class="reference external" href="http://cr.yp.to/">http://cr.yp.to/</a>, curve25519 is free from patent claims and there are open implementations
|
|
in both C and Java.</p>
|
|
</div>
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<span>Copyright © 2005-2013 Rasterbar Software.</span>
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