Analyzing the Characteristics of Gnutella Overlays

Mapping and analyzing the topological properties of P2P overlay network will benefit the further design and development of the P2P networks. In this paper, the measured Gnutella network topology is basically taken as an example. The properties of degree-rank distribution and frequency-degree distributions of the measured topology graphs are analyzed in detail. The small world characteristics for Gnutella network are discussed. The results indicate that each tier of Gnutella network shows individual characters, namely, the top level graph fits the power law in degree-rank distribution, but follows the Gaussian function in frequency-degree distribution. The bottom level graph shows power law both in its degree-rank distribution and in its frequency-degree distribution. Fitting results indicate that power law could fit better for the degree-rank distribution and frequency-degree distribution of bottom level graphs, while Gaussian could describe the frequency-degree distribution of the top level graphs. Gnutella overlay network has the small world characters, but it is not a scale-free network, which has developed over time following a different set of growth processes from those of the BA (Barabdsi-Albert) model. The measured results show that Gnutella network has pretty well scalability as well as the abilities to tolerating failures and attacks against peers, but with low routing efficiencies