UDP Protocol

[LeonAzul]

Please allow the "udp://" protocol as a tracker URI when creating a new .torrent file.

[not-important]

yes please allow it.

[jch]

Why?

(Not trolling -- I understand why the tracker operators want us to implement the UDP tracker protocol, but why should our users care about what is an internal implementation detail is beyond me.)

--jch

[demons33derxx]

TF (p2p blog) a couple of months to a year back wrote something in a couple of articles stating that UDP trackers allow for a smoother web browsing experience and possibly less congestion on ISPs networks. Only thing I can think of normal users might reference.

[jch]

UDP trackers allow for a smoother web browsing experience

You're confused. Not interfering with HTTP traffic is what µTP is designed to achieve. The UDP tracker protocol is a completely different beast.

--jch

[demons33derxx]

Well, then TF is wrong, I dont know either way, only citing what TF wrote about.

[jch]

If you're speaking about this article, then it's pretty clear they're speaking about µTP, not about the UDP tracker protocol.

TorrentFreak are pretty good, they seldom get their facts wrong.

--jch

[demons33derxx]

Nope, I was actually talking about this one http://torrentfreak.com/utorrents-2-0-b ... en-090809/

[jch]

TF [...] wrote [...]that UDP trackers allow for a smoother web browsing experience

Nowhere do they claim that in the article you cite. Quite the opposite -- they clearly say that:

In comparison to HTTP trackers, UDP trackers use less resources and put less strain on their servers.

I stand by my opinion -- TorrentFreak are pretty good and they rarely get their facts wrong.

--jch

[demons33derxx]

From the same article:

The benefits of UDP trackers will not go unnoticed by users either since they do not interfere with HTTP traffic, meaning that associated web-browsing slowdowns will be a thing of the past.

Now of course that can be dictionally compared or contrasted, but at that point it's just a semantic challenge with a stretch.
Anyway, this is getting rather pointless, it's like it has turned into some sort of debate about the veraciousness of TF.
It's a supposition as to why some regular users might use or would like to use UDP trackers.
I dont care if it's implemented or not really, as the only time I needed to use UDP trackers was in uTorrent back when Comcast was evil(er).

[demons33derxx]

Another supposition for a user would be be that the one of the most popular open trackers OpenBittorent(http://openbittorrent.com/) has removed it's HTTP tracker and now only uses UDP.

[Fiete5401]

+1 for UDP-support!

[Rolcol]

Yes, please bump the thread with short comments of "me too" without sharing any reasons why it should be added. </sarcasm>

[blacke4dawn]

I don't see why not.

If I understand the articles correctly TCP only adds transport verification which is already in the torrent protocol itself (by verifying the pieces them selfs) so it effectively is redundant. Couple that with LDP, PEX and DHT and you don't really need that frequent updates from a tracker which means you won't miss much if one tracker-update request goes missing.

It seems to me that moving to UDP will effectively remove most (all?) redundant or some (most?) unnecessary communication.

[jch]

I happen to know that Jordan is interested in getting UDP tracker support into transmission at some point; see ticket 117 for more.

(Off topic rant. Personally, I'm not as keen. First, I consider that the UDP tracker protocol fixes an issue that is best fixed in TCP -- there's no reason for TCP to use such huge amounts of memory on the server. Second, the current UDP tracker protocol is flawed, notably having no support for IPv6, which makes it somewhat pointless to implement in 2010. And third, I'm no longer so sure that trackers are such a good idea in the first place, since DHT and PEX pretty much replace them, private trackers be damned.)

So I guess that the current status is that it will certainly get implemented at some point, but you should not hold your breath.

--jch