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Ask HN: Why aren't system libraries/packages distributed using torrents?

15 points by james_morton ↗ HN
This looks like an ideal scenario for torrents, everyone has a copy of packages on the server so seeding will be through the roof, usually on the same network.

No more breaking the world because PyPi/NPM/apt mirror is down.

One tool could support every type of package repository, and then the main mirror will be 'constant' seeds that simply proxy the current locations e.g.:

https://pypi.python.org/whatever-4.3 => torrent://pypi.whatever-4.3

So that you can always get a copy.

5 comments

[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 25.2 ms ] thread
zepolen
I think speed would be the problem, getting 100 x 5mb packages would incur a lot of per file overhead.
dozzie
Please don't confuse system packages (as in DEB, RPM) with your language's packages (e.g. npm).

And you're not the first one to think of this. In fact, there was some work in Debian around this idea. Like, a decade ago.

https://wiki.debian.org/DebTorrent

brudgers
Windows 10 has peer to peer downloads for updates and apps.
wang_li
I'm sure it will come across as rude(?) but projects should provide their own infrastructure.

Microsoft did this with Windows 10 and it's just feels cheap. They have tons of money, they can pay for their own bandwidth.

bjourne
Bandwidth isn't a scarce resource for almost anyone in the Western World.