BitTorrent Dictionary (By a noob, for noobs!)

Here is my attempt at a simple BT dictionary. A lot of the BT glossaries out there are hard to understand for someone new to BT, or simply outdated, so I'm trying to make a more newb-friendly one. It is a work in progress, so I would really appreciate corrections and new suggestions for words not yet added. Do it for the newbs! :happy:

Source: My own (non-comprehensive) knowledge, misc websites, wikipedia, users like you :)

Q: What is bittorrent?

A: Google it. There are lots of easy to understand explanations out there, and they're all much better than anything I could write up. ;)

Bittorrent Terminology:

Torrent: A .torrent file is a file that contains the basic information about a file or set of files, plus everything that makes it downloadable. Open it with a bittorrent client to get the file!

Tracker: A server that keeps track of bittorrent clients. You don't download anything from the tracker, it just helps different users talk to each other and exchange pieces of the file!

Seed: Someone that's finished downloading the file. They only upload.

Peer/leech: Someone downloading and uploading the file at the same time. A leecher can also mean someone that only downloads without sharing back. This is bad! :P

Swarm: A group of users (seeders and leechers) connected to each other, sharing the same torrent. Like the super friends, only without the crime fighting. For exampke, if your bittorrent client tells you that you're connected to 6 peers and 2 seeds, your swarm is made up of you and those 8 other people.

Scrape: It tells your client how many seeds and peers are in the whole swarm, not just those you are connected to. When you see seeds 10 (25) and peers 12 (18), the numbers in brackets are coming from scrape. You would be connected to 10 out of a possible 25 seeds. (Thanks rvt!)

Share ratio: How much you've uploaded, divided by how much you've downloaded. A share ratio of 1.0 means you've uploaded as much as you've downloaded. It is considered common courtesy to upload at least as much as you download. Help everyone, not just yourself! :)

Hit and Run: Hit and Run is when a user doesn't seed back after finishing their download. This hurts everyone else and can hurt you too, depending on your tracker!

DHT: Distributed Hash Table, a feature that some BT (bittorrent) clients have. It allows them to find other peers and host a torrent without a tracker. Basically, it lets your swarm to continue as normal without a tracker (in case it goes down or something). :)

Public tracker: Trackers anyone can use. You may have to register, but there's never a user limit. Often lists torrents from multiple sites.

Private tracker: Trackers that require registration, and limits its number of users. Considered "safer" than public trackers, and known for higher speeds as well as more/specific content.

Snatched: How many times a torrent has been completed. Usually seen on private trackers.

Pretime: Pretime is the time a release (movies, games, music, etc.) appears on the internet for the first time. Private torrent sites try to make the releases available as fast as possible, often only minutes after the original pretime.

In bittorrent talk, the term "tracker pretime" describes the gap between the original pretime and the tracker release time. (Thanks for the definition, polarbear!)

NFO: A text file that often accompanies torrents. They contain information about the file! Viewed with a text editor or dedicated .nfo viewer.

Reseed: Sometimes, a torrent is left with zero seeders. All peers will eventually get stuck with an incomplete file, and someone with a complete copy of the file must "reseed" so others can finish their download.

PeerGuardian: A free, open-source program that filters out specific IP addresses for P2P users. Believed by some to lower your chances of being caught by anti-piracy groups.

That's all for now. Taking suggestions! :cool:

thanks for being so informative.

I think this is a great idea man and I hate to burst your bubble here but it's been Done already. A more popular one that I used when I was coming up was

Brian's BT faq and Guide

and the "dictionary" Part here

What do all these words mean? (seeding, uploading, share rating, etc.)

I remember browsing that guide too! :D

I'm trying to avoid the giant wall of text thing that a lot of BT guides have going on though. I'm just gonna take this idea and run with it. Are there any other terms that BT newbs should know about?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Detale

I think this is a great idea man and I hate to burst your bubble here but it's been Done already. A more popular one that I used when I was coming up was

Brian's BT faq and Guide

and the "dictionary" Part here

What do all these words mean? (seeding, uploading, share rating, etc.)

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http://www.elevatelife.net/burst_your_bubble1.jpg

One of the newer terms that is not on any guides would be "Hit and Run" (HnR)
Definition: to stop the torrent right after you finish downloading the file and not coming back to seed. Do too many of these on a private torrent site equals getting disabled.

I am sure there are other terms that are not some of those guides but I am to lazy at the moment to write them down. :P

clear

I'd definitely suggest clever along with its synonyms. Also, a connectability guide link would be a nice addition to that entry.

I think the problem with the dictionary that detale mentions is that a lot of the terminology there is just not in use anymore. I think that was penned back when things were more experimental and bittorent did not have the well-defined software implementation that it has today.

Really good for the noobs

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Detale

I think this is a great idea man and I hate to burst your bubble here but it's been Done already. A more popular one that I used when I was coming up was

Brian's BT faq and Guide

and the "dictionary" Part here

What do all these words mean? (seeding, uploading, share rating, etc.)

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Hate to agree but yup Brians BT faq explains it all. Do like the fact that you were trying to help out new members though. Much appreciated.:happy:

On second thought Brians BT guide is a little outdated, but still a great resource to go over.

If you're serious about making a new dictionary, you need to include terms like DHT, Availability, Tracker Updates, Banned Clients (A general definition of why clients are sometimes banned). I'd also recommend defining Peerguardian, Private tracker versus Public. Freeleech, Donations (might be too obvious, not sure), user ranks (user, power user, etc), Sysop, gazelle, hydra. Perhaps include definitions of some of the more... notorious public trackers, and private (although, keep descriptions of current ones minimal).

I'm sure there's a ton I'm forgetting... but it's 3 am in the morning, so you'll have to excuse me.

Well, this thread was useless as what posted here is common sense. Anyone who have never used torrent would still have basic concept of torrent from common terminology.

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Originally Posted by Detale

I hate to burst your bubble here but it's been Done already.

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^ Other note LOL now that was funny.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Scrape: When your client sends a request to the tracking server, asking for info on the torrent like who to share the file with and how well those other users are sharing.

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This part needs a major correction.

1) Announce is what tells you who to connect to. Scrape doesn't.

2) Scrape does not return any info about individual peers at all. It returns only the number of peers/seeds/completed for either the torrents requested using the info_hash parameter (can be repeated multiple times) or for all tracked torrents when no info_hash is defined.

3) Even announce does not tell you anything about how well anyone is sharing. Announce will only give you their IP, port and possibly peer_id. It is then up to your client to work out the rest.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rvt

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Scrape: When your client sends a request to the tracking server, asking for info on the torrent like who to share the file with and how well those other users are sharing.

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This part needs a major correction.

1) Announce is what tells you who to connect to. Scrape doesn't.

2) Scrape does not return any info about individual peers at all. It returns only the number of peers/seeds/completed for either the torrents requested using the info_hash parameter (can be repeated multiple times) or for all tracked torrents when no info_hash is defined.

3) Even announce does not tell you anything about how well anyone is sharing. Announce will only give you their IP, port and possibly peer_id. It is then up to your client to work out the rest.

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lol that would be great for a BitTorrent Dictionary for noobs

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Originally Posted by HyperNode

Well, this thread was useless as what posted here is common sense. Anyone who have never used torrent would still have basic concept of torrent from common terminology.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Detale

I hate to burst your bubble here but it's been Done already.

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^ Other note LOL now that was funny.

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People new to bittorrent will not understand most of the terminology; I was there not too long ago. (I thought client = customer = the person you get file from lol)
An other example: i wanted to learn more about newsgroup. Where do I go? To the newsgroup forum FST. I read the threads and don't understand what those guys were talking. I don't even want to ask questions because I don't even know how. I have to start reading the NewsGroups Guide For Newsleecher, and that too is not an easy read.

wht about invites thing :whistling

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Swarm: A group of users (seeders and leechers) connected to each other, sharing the same torrent. Like the super friends, only without the crime fighting. For exampke, if your bittorrent client tells you that you're connected to 6 peers and 2 seeds, your swarm is made up of you and those 8 other people.

Scrape: When your client sends a request to the tracking server, asking for info on the torrent like who to share the file with and how well those other users are sharing.

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thanks for these 2 definitions.
i didnt know what they meant.

Good stuff, thanks for taking the time

I added a few more terms, thanks for the suggestions guys. I'm still trying to keep the definitions simple and easy to understand.

Apparently I defined "scrape" wrong, can someone offer a more correct and simple definition? Again, thanks for the help. :D

Way to go Definite. Keep up the good work. Funny definitions :)

Simple definition of scrape:

It tells your client how many seeds and peers are in the whole swarm (not just those you are connected to).

When you see seeds 10 (25) and peers 12 (18) the numbers in brackets are coming from scrape. You would be connected to 10 out of a possible 25 seeds.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rvt

Simple definition of scrape:

It tells your client how many seeds and peers are in the whole swarm (not just those you are connected to).

When you see seeds 10 (25) and peers 12 (18) the numbers in brackets are coming from scrape. You would be connected to 10 out of a possible 25 seeds.

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Excellent, added. Thank you! :)

Added a few more, but I need a newb-friendly definition for "pretime".

good idea m8

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Added a few more, but I need a newb-friendly definition for "pretime".

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the time that has passed since it was first released by the group who released it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fusionz

good idea m8

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Added a few more, but I need a newb-friendly definition for "pretime".

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the time that has passed since it was first released by the group who released it.

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I have no idea what you just said. :P

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Added a few more, but I need a newb-friendly definition for "pretime".

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pretime is the time a release (movie, game, music, etc.) appears on the internet for the first time.
private torrent sites try to make the releases available as fast as possible, often only minutes after the original pretime.
in bittorrent talk the term "tracker pretime" describes the gap between the original pretime and the tracker release time.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Added a few more, but I need a newb-friendly definition for "pretime".

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pretime is the time a release (movie, game, music, etc.) appears on the internet for the first time.
private torrent sites try to make the releases available as fast as possible, often only minutes after the original pretime.
in bittorrent talk the term "tracker pretime" describes the gap between the original pretime and the tracker release time.

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Perfect, added. Thanks polarbear. :)

Any other ideas or suggestions on how I could improve this?

Added ".NFO" and "reseed". Looking for a newb-friendly definition for "availibility"!

This is turning out much better than I expected. :happy:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Looking for a newb-friendly definition for "availibility"!

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what do you mean with that? how well a torrent is seeded? i don't understand it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Looking for a newb-friendly definition for "availibility"!

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what do you mean with that? how well a torrent is seeded? i don't understand it.

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Here's a thorough but complicated definition, I was hoping someone could supply an alternative definition BT newbies could understand.

The number of full copies of the file available to the client. Each seed adds 1.0 to this number, as they have one complete copy of the file. A connected peer with a fraction of the file available adds that fraction to the availability (ie. a peer with 65.3% of the file downloaded increases the availability by 0.653).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

what do you mean with that? how well a torrent is seeded? i don't understand it.

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The number of full copies of the file available to the client.

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what's wrong with that? i think everyone should understand it. you might as well just call it the "number of seeders in the swarm"

i think it's more a client expression than actual bittorrent talk.

instead of asking how available a torrent is, people would just ask "how many seeders?" or "how is it seeded?"

"availibility" could also be understood in a sense of how many trackers list that torrent.

i'm pretty sure when you ask here how available a certain torrent is, people would rather tell you first where to find it and then how well it is seeded.

it's a bit confusing. i recommend not to put in on the list, but it is yours. so do as you please.

p.s. did you get a tl invite?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Polarbear

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Definite

The number of full copies of the file available to the client.

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what's wrong with that? i think everyone should understand it. you might as well just call it the "number of seeders in the swarm"

i think it's more a client expression than actual bittorrent talk.

instead of asking how available a torrent is, people would just ask "how many seeders?" or "how is it seeded?"

"availibility" could also be understood in a sense of how many trackers list that torrent.

i'm pretty sure when you ask here how available a certain torrent is, people would rather tell you first where to find it and then how well it is seeded.

it's a bit confusing. i recommend not to put in on the list, but it is yours. so do as you please.

p.s. did you get a tl invite?

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Yeah, you're right. Availability isn't a very importent term to know.

And no, I don't have a TL invite. I figured I'd have better luck next time they opened invites. I should have better ratio proofs and hopefully some BT rep to show by then. :happy:

Bump. Any suggestions?

Bump, still taking suggestions.