NAME

Net::BitTorrent::Version - The Net::BitTorrent project-wide version numbers

DESCRIPTION

Because of the problems coordinationg revision numbers in a distributed version control system and across a directory full of Perl modules, this module provides a central location for the project's overal release number, the version string provided in Extended Protocol handshakes, and the Peer ID generator.

Peer ID Specification

This section describes and provides examples of the Peer ID format used by the current release of the Net::BitTorrent module.

Format

This non-standard format was developed to be URL-safe, unique to the implementation, and "human parsable."

There are three distinct sections to the Peer IDs generated: the header, the mid-section, and the signature. Consider this example:

NB004S-rogzGB1v--SVN

Here, NB004S is the header, -rogzGB1v is the mid-section, and --SVN is the trailing signature.

Header

Two uppercase characters ('NB') followed by three digits representing the SVN revision number with leading zeros, a single character potentially indicating stability and how the release was obtained, and a single hyphen (-).

If the client is a CPAN build, the sixth byte is the capital letter 'C'. If the client is running a version checked out from public SVN (considered unstable), the sixth byte is the capital letter 'S'. Any other characters in the sixth byte are unsupported and may indicate a bad client.

Mid-section

Following that are eight random characters in the following range:

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-._~

That is, all uppercase and lowercase letters, decimal digits, as well as the hyphen, period, underscore, and tilde (66 total). These are all characters allowed in a URL without encoded (referred to as "Unreserved Characters in [rfc://3986]) to reduce weight on the tracker during announce. On a popular tracker, every bit (and byte) helps.

This section is inspired by the pseudo-base64 set used by SHADOW's BitTornado client.

Signature

The final five characters may be random or static and should not be used in identifying the version of the client software. Some early versions even have my name in this spot. .:shrugs:.

CPAN Version Numbers

Stable CPAN releases will have the sixth byte set to 'C' (capital letter 'c').

Unstable releases (referred to as DEVELOPER releases on PAUSE) on CPAN will have this bit set as if the user checked the source out from SVN, that is, the sixth byte will be 'S' (capital letter 's'). These will be released on CPAN with version numbers matching m[\d\.\d+_\d]. See the PAUSE FAQ section entitled "Developer Releases" (http://www.cpan.org/modules/04pause.html).

Version numbers will be some value less than one with the revision number in the three significant decimal places. Eventually, I would like to make a v1.0 release of Net::BitTorrent on CPAN. The information in this document and the means of generating the module's version number will need to reflect that.

Examples

NB393C-04.9EraQ--SVN

This would be the stable CPAN release v0.393. The --SVN signature should be ignored.

NB003X-9E-ayR6b-BT<3

Improper Peer ID; the sixth bit is neither 'C' nor 'S'. Possibly fake.

NB065S--09Egae69sy8W

Completely legal Peer ID generated by SVN/Dev r65.

Author

Sanko Robinson <sanko@cpan.org> - http://sankorobinson.com/

CPAN ID: SANKO

License and Legal

Copyright (C) 2008 by Sanko Robinson <sanko@cpan.org>

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of The Artistic License 2.0. See the LICENSE file included with this distribution or http://www.perlfoundation.org/artistic_license_2_0. For clarification, see http://www.perlfoundation.org/artistic_2_0_notes.

When separated from the distribution, all POD documentation is covered by the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/legalcode. For clarification, see http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/.

Neither this module nor the Author is affiliated with BitTorrent, Inc.

cpanm Net::BitTorrent

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install Net::BitTorrent