Local Peer Discovery

The Local Peer Discovery protocol, specified as BEP-14,^[1] is an extension to the BitTorrent file-distribution system. It is designed to support the discovery of local BitTorrent peers, aiming to minimize the traffic through the Internet service provider's (ISP) channel and maximize use of higher-bandwidth local area network (LAN).

Local Peer Discovery is implemented^[2] with HTTP-like messages on User Datagram Protocol (UDP) multicast group 239.192.152.143:6771 which is an administratively scoped multicast address. While it is implemented in several clients (µTorrent,^[3] BitTorrent/Mainline,^[4] MonoTorrent,^[5] libtorrent^[6] and its derivatives, Transmission 2.0,^[7] aria2 ^[8]) and implementation is very simple. An alternative multicast peer discovery protocol is published as BEP 26, but is not widely adopted since it is considered too complex^[9] in comparison.

References

1. "BEP 14: Local Service Discovery".
2. "Protocol Design Discussion » Local Peer Discovery Documentation". 2009-10-30. Retrieved 2009-12-12.
3. "Announcements » µTorrent 1.7 Release Candidate 6". 2007-06-28. Retrieved 2009-12-12.
4. "BitTorrent User Manual". Retrieved 2009-12-12.
5. "MonoTorrent 0.80". Retrieved 2010-05-05.
6. "libtorrent manual: features". Retrieved 2009-12-12.
7. "Changes : Transmission 2.00". 2010-06-15. Retrieved 2010-06-23.
8. "Aria2 Manual: OPTIONS". Retrieved 2015-09-14.
9. "Transmission Bug Tracker: Zeroconf Peer Advertising and Discovery". Retrieved 2016-10-26.