Opentracker is a free (licensed as

beerware Beerware is a tongue-in-cheek software license with permissive terms, which grants the right to do anything with the source code, assuming the license notice is preserved. Description Should the user of the code consider the software usefu ...

)

BitTorrent BitTorrent is a Protocol (computing), communication protocol for peer-to-peer file sharing (P2P), which enables users to distribute data and electronic files over the Internet in a Decentralised system, decentralized manner. The protocol is d ...

peer tracker software (a special kind of HTTP or UDP server software) that is designed to be fast and to have a low consumption of system resources.

Features

Several instances of opentracker may be run in a cluster, with all of them synchronizing with each other. Besides the

Hypertext Transfer Protocol HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) is an application layer protocol in the Internet protocol suite model for distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP is the foundation of data communication for the World Wide Web, wher ...

(HTTP) opentracker may also be connected to via

User Datagram Protocol In computer networking, the User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is one of the core communication protocols of the Internet protocol suite used to send messages (transported as datagrams in Network packet, packets) to other hosts on an Internet Protoco ...

(UDP), which creates less than half of the tracker traffic HTTP creates. It supports

IPv6 Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the most recent version of the Internet Protocol (IP), the communication protocol, communications protocol that provides an identification and location system for computers on networks and routes traffic ...

gzip gzip is a file format and a software application used for file compression and decompression. The program was created by Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler as a free software replacement for the compress program used in early Unix systems, and ...

compression of full scrapes, and

blacklist Blacklisting is the action of a group or authority compiling a blacklist of people, countries or other entities to be avoided or distrusted as being deemed unacceptable to those making the list; if people are on a blacklist, then they are considere ...

s of torrents. Because there have already been cases of people being accused of copyright violation by the fact that their IP address was listed on a BitTorrent tracker, opentracker may mix in random IP address numbers for the purpose of

plausible deniability Plausible deniability is the ability of people, typically senior officials in a formal or informal chain of command, to deny knowledge or responsibility for actions committed by or on behalf of members of their organizational hierarchy. They may ...

Technology

It runs completely in RAM, accounting for much of its speed advantage over other tracker software. It is written in C and based on the

library A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...

''libowfat'' that manages network connections. For some new functionality like the UDP support with IPv6 or the syncing of several instances of BitTorrent tracker software, new extensions to the BitTorrent protocol were made.

Adoption

The world's largest tracker at

The Pirate Bay The Pirate Bay, commonly abbreviated as TPB, is a free searchable online index of Film, movies, music, video games, Pornographic film, pornography and software. Founded in 2003 by Swedish think tank , The Pirate Bay facilitates the connection ...

switched from their selfmade software ''Hypercube'' to opentracker in the end of 2007. The

Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (), commonly known by its initialism NRK, is a Norwegian state-run, government-influenced radio and television public broadcasting company. The NRK broadcasts three national TV channels and thirteen nat ...

uses it to distribute their own TV shows. Popular public torrent trackers opentrackr and coppersurfer are known to use opentracker.

References

External links

*
Stories from an Opentracker
(blog)
Git repository

– lecture of the software author at the 24th

Chaos Communication Congress The Chaos Communication Congress is an annual hacker conference organized by the Chaos Computer Club. The congress features a variety of lectures and workshops on technical and political issues related to security, cryptography, privacy and ...

{{BitTorrent BitTorrent tracker for Linux Free network-related software

Features

Technology

Adoption

See also

References

Further reading

External links