Re: [circle] Definitions of various node classes?

[Jiri Baum]

Paul Campbell:
> What's a cohort vs. a node vs. a neighbor vs. a peer? It almost appears
> that there are different classes of nodes in the node base class, although
> I thought Circle was pretty much symmetric (everybody is equal).

- "node" is the generic word

- "peer" is usually "a node other than oneself"

Sometimes, "peer" is used generically to mean "node", as in "peer-to-peer"; 
that's just to emphasise that all nodes are equal, as opposed to other 
networks which may have servers and clients, masters and slaves, etc.

The list of peers kept by the circle client is intentionally incomplete, so 
sometimes "peer" means one of the those on that list.

- neighbour is a node immediately adjacent on the circle

- cohort has to do with the way hash values are smeared for load-sharing; it 
refers to the list of nodes within the smear

Jiri
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Jiri Baum <address@hidden>           http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jirib
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