Fluid-diffusive modelling for large P2P file-sharing systems

摘要

This article presents an application of the basic concepts of statistical physics to devise an approximate model describing the dynamics of large peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing networks, based on fluid-diffusive equations. The model we propose is quite general and highly modular and allows to represent several effects related to resource distribution among peers, user behaviour, resource localization algorithms and dynamic structure of the overlay topology. As the complexity of the model is largely independent of the system size, it provides an effective method for the analysis of very large P2P systems.