Parallel file download

[jrig]

Couldnt think of a good place to post this, please move as appropriate

I have 2 servers in separate locations - One is an ISP shared server, and the other sits in my house. I'm wondering if there is a way to host an identical file on both boxes and when a user wants to download the file I can pull pieces off of both boxes simultaneously. The idea being that one server has 300Kb/s up and the other has 200Kb/s up so that the file could be dl'd at around 500Kb/s +- because of overhead. I might even be able to find a couple other mirrors to further enhance speeds.

Both servers are *nix boxes, admin on 1 root on the other. Anyone have an idea about how to go about this, google is not yielding much help...perhaps I just need the right terminology. Thanks-

 

[feherke]

Hi

The right terminology ? I would try "torrent".

Really. Although the HTTP protocol's version 1.1 supports requests for partial files, the browsers will not combine automatically the pieces received from different URLs. So you will have to script it. But JavaScript can not reach the local storage devices by default, so the visitor will have to give extra permission to your script. ( Personally I do not give such permission to anything. ) So finally you will find yourself writing an almost complete download utility. Then why not use an existing technology ?

Feherke.

http://rootshell.be/~feherke/

 

[jrig]

Of course I know what a torrent is. As far as scripting goes, I wouldnt even dream of trying to accomplish something like this with javascript.

Im thinking php or asp - i can do either (heck even perl!). I dont want to build from scratch either though. Can you mention some of these download utilities that can grab file parts from more than 1 one server and serve them up to the client? I'll be more than happy to hack them together for my purposes, thanks-

 

[feherke]

Hi

Im thinking php or asp - i can do either (heck even perl!).

Ok, you can solve the server side part with them. ( But as I mentioned, you have nothing to solve there. ) And what you intend to do on the client side ?

Can you mention some of these download utilities that can grab file parts from more than 1 one server and serve them up to the client?

As far as I know, DAP ( Download Accelerator Plus ) can do it. But as I understand, it uses a predefined list of mirrors.

You can see the Multi-source article on Wikipedia, but it is not really helpful.

Feherke.

http://rootshell.be/~feherke/