WebTorrent is a peer-to-peer streaming torrent client written in JavaScript.
For a long time the use of torrents was quite popular until the arrival of direct downloads and after that to the other solutions that were born due to the demand to be able to share information, in addition to the fact that part of the popularity of torrents was due to the fact that too much piracy was shared by this means.
After that and to date, torrent has not stopped being used, Although to a lesser extent, it still has a large number of users who prefer this medium to be able to share and obtain files, from Linux distributions, books, information, images, among others.
The different Existing torrent clients offer various features, although one that has always been in high demand, It's the power use a web browser as a client and thereby facilitate many things.
Given this, WebTorrent was born, written entirely in JavaScript, it uses WebRTC for peer-to-peer transport. No browser plugins, extensions or installation required. Using open web standards, WebTorrent connects website users to form a distributed and decentralized network. Unlike PeerCDN, WebTorrent is free software.
The protocol WebTorrent works exactly like the BitTorrent protocol, except that it uses WebRTC instead of TCP/uTP as a transport protocol. Cross-browser communication cuts out the middlemen and allows users to communicate on their own terms. No more client/server, just a network of peers, all the same. "WebTorrent is the first step in a process of recentralizing the web," writes WebTorrent.
To support the WebRTC connection model, the WebTorrent team made some changes to the tracking protocol. Therefore, a browser-based WebTorrent client or "web peer" can only connect to other clients that support WebTorrent/WebRTC.
Once the peers are connected, the wired protocol used to communicate is exactly the same as in regular BitTorrent. This should make it easy to add WebTorrent support to existing popular torrent clients like Transmission and uTorrent.
“The way we code the web will determine how we live online. So we need to integrate our values into our code. Freedom of expression must be built into our code. Privacy must be built into our code. Universal access to all knowledge. But right now those values aren't embedded on the web,” says Brewster Kahle, founder of the Internet Archive.
One of the most interesting uses of WebTorrent is peer-assisted streaming.. Non-profit projects like Wikipedia and the Internet Archive could reduce bandwidth and hosting costs by allowing visitors to participate. Popular content is streamed from browser to browser. Infrequently accessed content is reliably served over HTTP from the origin server.
As well there are some interesting business use cases, from CDNs to application delivery.
“WebTorrent has significant commercial potential to radically change the traditional notion of client-server, with applications for internal infrastructure and closed communications from external users. WebTorrent has gone from being an idea to a scientific experiment and is now on the brink of becoming viable. It's really cool,” says Chris Kranky.
It should be noted that in the browser, WebTorrent can only download torrents served by a WebRTC-compliant torrent client. Below are the WebRTC compatible torrent clients:
- WebTorrent Desktop - Open source torrent streaming client. For Mac, Windows and Linux;
- Vuze: powerful and complete torrent client;
- Playback: Open source JavaScript video player;
- [* ]webtorrent-hybrid: Node.js package (command line and API);
- Instant.io: Simple WebTorrent client on a website;
- βTorrent – Client: Full WebTorrent for browser;
- TorrentMedia : Bureau's WebTorrent Client.
Finally, if you are interested in knowing more about it, you can consult the details In the following link.
Get WebTorrent
For those interested in getting WebTorrent, you should know that in node.js, webtorrent-hybrid can download torrents from WebRTC peers or TCP peers. To install webtorrent-hybrid, just run the following command in a terminal.
npm install webtorrent-hybrid –g