SpeedDate data exchanges

What am I looking at?

On the right you see an animation of MaRVIN peers exchanging data (you may need to zoom in). The horizontal axis shows 100 different peers, the vertical axis shows 100 different keys. Each white dot at (x,y) means that peer X holds one piece of data with key Y. The brighter the dot, the more data this peer has.

What is the data exchange strategy?

In this animation, peers exchange data according to a speed-dating strategy, which is our hybrid technique between the targeted model of a DHT and the uniform model of the random exchange. Peers try to specialise and ask for only "their" data items, but also offer help to overloaded peers around them. The result is a clustering of data around the peer responsible, with close-by peers helping out.

What are the advantages of this strategy?

With this approach, the peers maintain optimal load balance, as in the random distribution. On the other hand, data items meet almost as much as in the directed approach of the DHT. Thus, for our particular task, it seems that this hybrid approach gives us the best of both worlds.

What are the disadvantages of this strategy?

We don't know yet how well the strategy scales with more nodes, more keys, and more data: we don't know yet how it behaves in different circumstances. We are continuing our research to find answers to these questions.