Knoppix_3.7_BitTorrent

[Cousin Stanley]

Greetings ....

This week-end I went off looking for a download
for Knoppix 3.7 ....

Trying a few download mirrors from Knoppix.org,
I found that ....

o Not all of them have the 3.7 version available

o Of the several I tried, all of the download speeds
were well below that I usually get on a decent
aDSL connection .... { 1.6 Mbps down | 760 Kbps up }

So I decided to give BitTorrent downloading a try
for the first time ....

http://www.bittorrent.com

BitTorrent shares the downloader's upload bandwidth
among other downloaders ....

Installing a BitTorrent Client was simple
using Debian GNU/Linux ....

# apt-get install qtorrent

BitTorrent.Com also lists a Windows installer
and I think a version for the Mac as well ....

BitTorrent is Python-Based,
thus cross-platform functionality
is expected ....

The Knoppix BitTorrent Tracker provides
a .torrent file that is first downloaded
and used with the BitTorrent Client to download
the Knoppix .iso file ....

The first 15-20% of the download was a bit slow
but began to increase in speed and by about 30%
completion it was running at almost full speed
for my aDSL connection limit ....

Before it was done 2 others were simultaneously
dowloading from my upload bandwidth at about
half of my upload bandwidth for each ....

After the download was complete, the md5 sum
for the downloaded .iso file was spot-on correct ....

Burned the .iso file to CD-R using BurnAtOnce
and it booted Knoppix 3.7 with no problem
using the Linux 2.4.27 kernel ....

boot: knoppix lang=us

However, booting with the Linux 2.6.9 kernel
was very problematic on this machine,
to the point of almost non-usable ....

boot: knoppix26 lang=us

So, my first BitTorrent experience
was very positive and I will probably
use it again in the future ....

I haven't explored the security issues
of BitTorrent at all and am a little nervous
about it, but felt somewhat safe about
using it for Knoppix ....

Any other opinions ?

 

[Gordon Darling]

On Mon, 03 Jan 2005 08:17:30 -0700, Cousin Stanley wrote:

snippage

So, my first BitTorrent experience
was very positive and I will probably
use it again in the future ....

I haven't explored the security issues
of BitTorrent at all and am a little nervous
about it, but felt somewhat safe about
using it for Knoppix ....

Any other opinions ?

Always works fine here. No known security implications. Have a look at

http://www.filesoup.com/faq/

Give you a couple of days reading material!

Regards
Gordon

 

[Colin Copland]

So, my first BitTorrent experience
was very positive and I will probably

I tend to use BitTorrent for all my Linux .iso downloads if they are
available.

The distros FTP sites are usually so slow, presume because of the demand.

 

[BananaOfTheNight]

I haven't explored the security issues

of BitTorrent at all and am a little nervous
about it, but felt somewhat safe about
using it for Knoppix ....

Firstly, look for a newsgroup called alt.bittorrent - that is much more
relevant to your current interests. This group is for the discussion of
freeware (which Linux and BT might fall into, but there are more
specific groups out there).

If you mean safety as in not getting rabid wild law scum set on you,
then you are almost completely safe - getting Linux distros is not
illegal and the movie industry (which is currently going after
BitTorrent tracker sites and probably users) is being quite precise in
their targeting (only going for movies and suchlike, as opposed to the
RIAA's carpet lawsuits).

As for getting correct files (as in not virus or spyware-infested), make
sure that you get your torrents from a decent site (the homepage for the
distro is a good place to start) so that you are being pointed towards
the correct files. Anybody trying to substitute an altered file will be
spotted due to the hashing algorithm checks and your BT client will not
accept the data.

If you are trying to warez things (not advised, please feed the hungry
developers, some law stuff, blah, blah, blah), then there is a program
called PeerGuardian, at http://www.methlabs.org/methlabs.htm which will
block connection attempts to and from known corporate spies (note that
it will block a few things that you want to do, like connecting to the
Tribes 2 master server)

Let me re-iterate that if you really like something then please buy it
to support the developers (or find a free equivalent - much less
hassle). There are a lot of conflicting (and some quite valid) views on
either side of the download for zilch/shell out for it argument - think
about what you are doing and make a choice yourself (don't let anyone
tell you what to do - we can only offer advice).

 

[Cousin Stanley]

| Always works fine here.

Good to know ....

| No known security implications.

Also good to know ....

| Have a look at
|
| http://www.filesoup.com/faq/
|
| Give you a couple of days reading material!

Cousin Gordon ....

Thanks for the link ....

However, the set of 42 Virtual Monks
that I now use as Virtual Reading Assistant Bots
already have a fairly extensive queue of material
to be cataloged and read at hand, so it may be a while
before I can manage any more, but VM-VRAB-27 promised
to add it to the queue ....

And thanks again for the reassurance
regarding BitTorrent usage ....

 

[Cousin Stanley]

| I tend to use BitTorrent for all my Linux .iso downloads
| if they are available.
|
| The distros FTP sites are usually so slow,
| presume because of the demand.

Colin ....

Thanks for the reassurance ....

It's always good to know others
also have had positive results ....

Other than a couple of earlier Knoppix versions,
knx_3.2 & knx_3.4, the only other Linux distribution
that I downloaded .iso files for was Mandrake 10 ....

That was several months ago, but I seem to recall
that the download rate was very good at the time ....

After my initial positive BitTorrent experience,
I will definitely consider using it again
in the future ....

 

[Cousin Stanley]

| Firstly, look for a newsgroup called alt.bittorrent -

Thanks for the news group pointer ....

Having no initial difficulties or questions at the time,
I hadn't thought to look yet ...

| that is much more relevant to your current interests.

My current interests at the moment in this particular context
were simply to find a download site for Knoppix 3.7 that might
provide good download rates ....

| This group is for the discussion of freeware ....

I've only been reading this group daily for about 5 years ....

Maybe if I read it daily for another 5 or 10 years,
I will eventually figure out what's it's for ....

| ( which Linux and BT might fall into,
| but there are more specific groups out there ).

I subscribe to a few others as well,
but I'm not exactly what they are for either ....

| If you mean safety as in not getting rabid wild law scum set on you, |
then you are almost completely safe -
|
| getting Linux distros is not illegal and the movie industry
| (which is currently going after BitTorrent tracker sites
| and probably users) is being quite precise in their targeting
| (only going for movies and suchlike, as opposed to the RIAA's
| carpet lawsuits).

Not worried about the law problems at the moment,
as I don't have a DVD drive for the 'puter I use,
so don't download movies ....

| As for getting correct files (as in not virus or spyware-infested),
| make sure that you get your torrents from a decent site (the homepage
| for the distro is a good place to start) so that you are being pointed
| towards the correct files. Anybody trying to substitute an altered
| file will be spotted due to the hashing algorithm checks and your
| BT client will not accept the data.

These were the type of security issues I had in mind ....

I felt relatively safe initiating the download
via the Knoppix BitTorrent Tracker, but having
no previous BT expeience I was a bit concerned
about potential problems ....

| If you are trying to warez things ( not advised, ....

I don't do warez of any flavor ....

| please feed the hungry developers ....

IR12 ....

| then there is a program called PeerGuardian,
| at http://www.methlabs.org/methlabs.htm
| which will block connection attempts to and from
| known corporate spies ....

Thanks for the link ....

I'll take a look ....

| Let me re-iterate that if you really like something
| then please buy it to support the developers
| (or find a free equivalent - much less hassle).

I'm a broke developer myself and other than
a Win98_OS, I use 100% freeware or Open Source Software ....

Current OS is Debian GNU/Linux ....

| There are a lot of conflicting (and some quite valid) views
| on either side of the download for zilch/shell out for it
| argument -

Yep there sure are ....

| think about what you are doing and make a choice yourself
| (don't let anyone tell you what to do - we can only offer advice).

I've been thinking about what I'm doing and making
my own choices for most of my 58 years ....

Thanks for the info ....

 

[Richard Steven Hack]

Trying a few download mirrors from Knoppix.org,
I found that ....

o Not all of them have the 3.7 version available

o Of the several I tried, all of the download speeds
were well below that I usually get on a decent
aDSL connection .... { 1.6 Mbps down | 760 Kbps up }

If you ever the University of Florida on a download mirror, grab it -
they usually run at full DSL speed.

BitTorrent.Com also lists a Windows installer
and I think a version for the Mac as well ....

There are a zillion BitTorrent clients around. Azureous is one that
comes to mind. I use TorrentStorm myself on Windows 2000.

The Knoppix BitTorrent Tracker provides
a .torrent file that is first downloaded
and used with the BitTorrent Client to download
the Knoppix .iso file ....

The one problem I always have with BitTorrent downloads is getting a
torrent file that is still working. The last one I tried actually
reported that it wasn't working because "there are too many leechers
and not enough seeders". Welcome to the BitTorrent world of "limits"!
Which I thought BitTorrent was supposed to solve... Guess not...

The first 15-20% of the download was a bit slow
but began to increase in speed and by about 30%
completion it was running at almost full speed
for my aDSL connection limit ....

Yes, it goes very slow at first, then speeds up to an acceptable
speed.

However, booting with the Linux 2.6.9 kernel
was very problematic on this machine,
to the point of almost non-usable ....

I had problems with Knoppix 3.6, whereas Knoppix 3.3 booted on my
machine with no problems. 3.6 required me to use the noapic boot
option. Then I had to tweak the X11 config file because my ancient
ViewSonic 6 couldn't handle the default horizontal refresh rate.

Any other opinions ?

Here's an interesting article on BitTorrent I just found:
http://www.joestewart.org/p2p.html

And here's a presentation at the BlackHat Conference by the author of
BitTorrent are possible security issues:
www.blackhat.com/presentations/bh-europe-03/bh-europe-03-cohen.pdf

 

[Cousin Stanley]

| If you ever the University of Florida on a download mirror,
| grab it - they usually run at full DSL speed.

I do remember trying one of the Knoppix mirrors
from a university in Florida, but don't remember
which one ....

Maybe I wandered in at a busy or problematic time
on their end ....

| The one problem I always have with BitTorrent downloads
| is getting a torrent file that is still working.
|
| The last one I tried actually reported
| that it wasn't working because
| "there are too many leechers and not enough seeders".

Perhaps I was blessed with a bit of luck,
as my first attempt worked like a charm ....

And perhaps with more BitTorrent download attempts,
I'll see this problem as well ....

Only 2 other leechers showed up throughout
the entire Knoppix download, and both had
dropped out before my download had finished ....

| ....
| I had problems with Knoppix 3.6,
| whereas Knoppix 3.3 booted
| on my machine with no problems.
|
| 3.6 required me to use the noapic boot option.

I tried the noapic boot option with Knoppix 3.4
in an attempt to improve net connection problems
with a 2.6.x kernel, but it didn't help ....

The net connection problems with 2.6.x kernels
on this machine with the particular NIC that I use
have now surfaced in ....

o Knoppix ......... Kernel 3.4 , 3.7
o Mandrake 10 ..... Kernel 2.6.x
o Debian Sarge .... Kernel 2.6.8-1

I spent several long days last week Google-izing,
NewsGroup diving, and re-configuring trying
to fix net connection failures with Debian Sarge
and a 2.6 kernel on this machine ....

Since I'm not the only kid on the block
to experience these problems, and since
I've spent too much time already trying
unsuccessfully to fix it, I've accepted
that providence for whatever reason doesn't
want a 2.6 kernel on THIS particular machine
with THIS particular NIC ....

| Here's an interesting article on BitTorrent I just found:
|
| http://www.joestewart.org/p2p.html
|
| And here's a presentation at the BlackHat Conference
| by the author of BitTorrent are possible security issues:
|
| www.blackhat.com/presentations/bh-europe-03/bh-europe-03-cohen.pdf

Thanks for the links
and thanks for the feedback ....

 

[RodneyKShanley]

Greetings ....

This week-end I went off looking for a download
for Knoppix 3.7 ....

Trying a few download mirrors from Knoppix.org,
I found that ....

o Not all of them have the 3.7 version available

o Of the several I tried, all of the download speeds
were well below that I usually get on a decent
aDSL connection .... { 1.6 Mbps down | 760 Kbps up }

So I decided to give BitTorrent downloading a try
for the first time ....

http://www.bittorrent.com

BitTorrent shares the downloader's upload bandwidth
among other downloaders ....

Installing a BitTorrent Client was simple
using Debian GNU/Linux ....

# apt-get install qtorrent

BitTorrent.Com also lists a Windows installer
and I think a version for the Mac as well ....

BitTorrent is Python-Based,
thus cross-platform functionality
is expected ....

The Knoppix BitTorrent Tracker provides
a .torrent file that is first downloaded
and used with the BitTorrent Client to download
the Knoppix .iso file ....

The first 15-20% of the download was a bit slow
but began to increase in speed and by about 30%
completion it was running at almost full speed
for my aDSL connection limit ....

Before it was done 2 others were simultaneously
dowloading from my upload bandwidth at about
half of my upload bandwidth for each ....

After the download was complete, the md5 sum
for the downloaded .iso file was spot-on correct ....

Burned the .iso file to CD-R using BurnAtOnce
and it booted Knoppix 3.7 with no problem
using the Linux 2.4.27 kernel ....

boot: knoppix lang=us

However, booting with the Linux 2.6.9 kernel
was very problematic on this machine,
to the point of almost non-usable ....

boot: knoppix26 lang=us

So, my first BitTorrent experience
was very positive and I will probably
use it again in the future ....

I haven't explored the security issues
of BitTorrent at all and am a little nervous
about it, but felt somewhat safe about
using it for Knoppix ....

Any other opinions ?

Speaking of BitTorrent............................

To prepare BitTorrent for use I downloaded and installed :
a.. Python, version 2.4
b.. wxPython2.5-win32-unicode-2.5.3.1-py24.exe
c.. py2exe for Python ver 2.4
d.. nsis203.exe


Then
a.. "in a shell, go to the root BitTorrent directory and run this
command -python winsetup.py py2exe "


Using winXP command prompt I ran the command in the BitTorrent root dir.

[Python.exe could not be found on first try (not in command path?).]



Then

"wxPython.wx", "_curses", and "psyco" went missing and are not on my
computer according to MS Search; but the command seemed to finish correctly.

a.. Proceeded to " run nsis on bittorrent.nsi" by using
"c:\progra~1\nsis\makensis.exe bittorrent.nsi"


The result is as below:

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.


C:\>cd program files\nsis\

C:\Program Files\NSIS>makensis.exe bittorrent.nsi
MakeNSIS v2.03 - Copyright 1999-2004 Nullsoft, Inc.

Portions Copyright (C) 1995-1998 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler (zlib).
Portions Copyright (C) 1996-2002 Julian R Seward (bzip2).
Portions Copyright (C) 1999-2003 Igor Pavlov (lzma).

Contributors: (e-mail address removed), Ryan Geiss, Andras Varga, Drew Davidson,
Peter Wi
ndridge, Dave Laundon, Robert Rainwater, Yaroslav Faybishenko, Jeff Doozan,
Amir
Szekely, Ximon Eighteen, et al.

Processing config:
Processing plugin dlls: "C:\Program Files\NSIS\Plugins\*.dll"
- advsplash::show
- Banner::destroy
- Banner::getWindow
- Banner::show
- BgImage::AddImage
- BgImage::AddText
- BgImage::Clear
- BgImage:estroy
- BgImage::Redraw
- BgImage::SetBg
- BgImage::SetReturn
- BgImage::Sound
- Dialer::AttemptConnect
- Dialer::AutodialHangup
- Dialer::AutodialOnline
- Dialer::AutodialUnattended
- Dialer::GetConnectedState
- InstallOptions::dialog
- InstallOptions::initDialog
- InstallOptions::show
- LangDLL::LangDialog
- Math::Script
- nsExec::Exec
- nsExec::ExecToLog
- nsExec::ExecToStack
- nsisdl::download
- nsisdl::download_quiet
- splash::show
- StartMenu::Select
- System::Alloc
- System::Call
- System::Copy
- System::Free
- System::Get
- System::Int64Op
- System::Store
- TypeLib::GetLibVersion
- TypeLib::Register
- TypeLib::UnRegister
- UserInfo::GetAccountType
- UserInfo::GetName
- VPatch::vpatchfile

!define: "MUI_INSERT_NSISCONF"=""

Can't open script "bittorrent.nsi"

C:\Program Files\NSIS>



BitTorrent.exe is not on my computer according to MS Search

I am a hack and do not understand very well anything that is too technical.

WHAT WENT WRONG? and how do I correct it?

RodneyK

 

[Cousin Stanley]

| Speaking of BitTorrent ....................
|
| To prepare BitTorrent for use I downloaded and installed :
|
| a.. Python, version 2.4
| b.. wxPython2.5-win32-unicode-2.5.3.1-py24.exe
| c.. py2exe for Python ver 2.4
| d.. nsis203.exe

Cousin RodneyK ....

I'm familar with a, b, c above
and only know that d exists
but have never used it ....

a. Python ...... The Python Language Interpreter
for running Python programs

b. wxPython .... A GUI framework

c. py2exe ...... Builds an executable .exe file
from a Python program under Windows
that can run *without* a separate
installation of the Python interpreter

d. nsis203 ..... NullSoft Installer ?

Since you installed both Python and wxPython,
I'm not sure at this point if py2exe and nsis203
are necessary ....

py2exe is usually employed to generate stand-alone executables
for distribution to those that do *not* have a local Python
installation ....

In that case nsis might then be used to install the .exe file
previously generated by py2exe ....

You can check that wxPython is installed correctly
at the command line ....

python

If you don't see any error messages from this import statement,
then wxPython is OK ....

I have a small example Python program that displays a frame
with a simple text message including the wxPython version ....

http://fastq.com/~sckitching/Python/wxp_version.py
[ 2 KB ]

To test it ....

python wxp_version.py


| Then
| a.. "in a shell, go to the root BitTorrent directory ....
|
| and run this command
|
| python winsetup.py py2exe
|

Are there files files *other than* winsetup.py
with the .py extension in the BitTorrent dir ?

If so, this might indicate that you already
have a BitTorrent client that can be run
directly from the Python Interpreter
and that py2exe and nsis aren't required ....

If not, if the winsetup.py file isn't too big,
post a copy here and maybe I can get a few clues
from it ....

| ....
|
| Then
|
| "wxPython.wx", "_curses", and "psyco"
| went missing and are not on my computer
| according to MS Search; but the command seemed to finish correctly.

A missing wxPython.wx might be indicative
of wxPython version differences ....

The version of the BitTorrent client
that you have may have been written for an
earlier version of wx and this could be problematic
requiring either changing BT clients or wx versions ....

Psyco is an add-on module for optimizing Python
code at run time and including it can often
lead to significant improvements in execution speed ....

I think there is info available about downloading
Pysco at Python.Org ....

| C:\>cd program files\nsis\
|
| C:\Program Files\NSIS>makensis.exe bittorrent.nsi
| MakeNSIS v2.03 - Copyright 1999-2004 Nullsoft, Inc.
| ....
| ....
| ....
| !define: "MUI_INSERT_NSISCONF"=""
|
| Can't open script "bittorrent.nsi"

Is bittorrent.nsi in the same dir
as the nsis program ?

Maybe including the full path
to the .nsi file on the nsis
command line might help ....

makensis.exe C:\somePathTO\someWhereELSE\bittorrent.nsi

| BitTorrent.exe is not on my computer according to MS Search

You might try searching for bittorrent only
without including the .exe extension and see
what else turns up ....

Finding related .py files would be
of particular interest ....

| I am a hack and do not understand very well anything
| that is too technical.

Cousin Rodney I'm a hack too and many things technical
often hurt my head and have for most of my life ....

The frustration is often obscure language
that tends to mask what may be simple concepts ....

However, I try to muddle through as best I can ....

| WHAT WENT WRONG? and how do I correct it?

Can't say for sure what went wrong,
but hopefully I've provided at least
some info that might help ....

Someone earlier in this thread
suggested the NewsGroup alt.bittorrent ....