A leading application of peer-to-peer technology is file sharing. Because of its scale – in the millions of users daily – it is important that file-sharing systems have good search capabilities. A salient characteristic of these systems is that shared files are binary and described solely by small descriptors, in contrast to the self-describing nature of text document sharing systems. Experimental evidence indicates that it is possible to adopt and modify information retrieval techniques to these systems to improve their search accuracy.

Peer-to-peer information systems have gained prominence of late with applications such as file sharing systems and grid computing. However, the information retrieval component of these systems is still limited because traditional techniques for searching and ranking are not directly applicable. This work compares search in peer-to-peer information systems to that in metasearch engines, and describes how they are unique. Many works describing advances in peer-to-peer information retrieval are cited. 1

Peer-to-peer information systems have gained prominence of late with applications such as file sharing systems and grid computing. However, the information retrieval component of these systems is still limited because traditional techniques for searching and ranking are not directly applicable. This work compares search in peer-to-peer information systems to that in metasearch engines, and describes how they are unique. Many works describing advances in peer-to-peer information retrieval are cited.