Building a BitTorrent Client in Elixir: Exploring the BitTorrent Protocol

2023/07/29

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The article explores the BitTorrent protocol and guides readers through the process of building a minimal BitTorrent client in Elixir. The BitTorrent protocol, developed in the early 2000s, revolutionized file-sharing by enabling peer-to-peer sharing without relying on a centralized server. The article focuses on implementing the original BitTorrent spec and uses a Debian ISO torrent file for testing purposes. It also explains the Bencode format, which is used to represent dictionaries, lists, and integers in a human-readable manner. The article covers the structure of the metainfo file, including the keys and their corresponding values. Additionally, it discusses the piece length, SHA-1 hashes, and the process of downloading and verifying file pieces from peers. The author utilizes the Bento library for parsing the metainfo file and provides helpful functions for converting the parsed data into the desired format. This article is a valuable resource for developers interested in understanding the inner workings of the BitTorrent protocol and building their own BitTorrent clients.