Dynamic Maelstrom Sites

[jimmy90]

Is there a build of Maelstrom that can create torrent sites with content that can be updated by the publisher or by other users of the torrent site?

[opsoyo]

I've been wondering this same thing, but using the current BitTorrent protocol one would have to make a new torrent for every change as it would modify the infohash. That'd be the life of client-side updates to JavaScript, CSS, and HTML. Of course, you could have the JavaScript made to request more code/data from a centralized host and process it that way. Not sure how recommended that is. I definitely know eval-ing code is not recommended if avoidable.

 

But, you're talking about dynamic PHP, ASP, or some other server-side language, no? At this point, unless some dev. as an ace up his/her sleeve, that's not possible. Somewhere and somehow, an interpreter would be needed to process those dynamic files/requests whether it be by the local machine or sending the request to another client in the swarm. And, at that point, Maelstrom might as well be a different type of mesh network.

 

There could be a solution to the updating-of-static-files issue, but it would need Maelstrom to incorporate a reaction feature of some kind. Perhaps, via an auth. code or secret for obvious reasons, one could update a torrent by forcing the Maelstrom clients' reaction to a header or message of that would point it to the newer or newest infohash. That message may be part of the torrent file itself, as a text file, but the Maelstrom client would need a function to understand it.

 

TL;DR:

• Not technically or by utilizing server-side languages.
• In theory, JavaScript could work as way to communicate with a central host.
• In theory, Maelstrom could have a static-file update feature, but would need functionality and understands that it doesn't appear to have at this time.

[jimmy90]

great points opsoyo - i was thinking along the same lines.

 

i think there could be static data (templates, code, images, videos, etc) and dynamic data (database tables, serialised objects, distributed databases!, etc) all of which could be updated using some administrative signature or similar mechanism so the client knows it's really part of the site.

 

a similar approach could be used to allow members of a site to publish dynamic data as well as administrators.