BitTorrent is a tool for distributing files. It's extremely 
easy to use - downloads are started by clicking on hyperlinks.
Whenever more than one person is downloading at once 
they send pieces of the file(s) to each other, thus relieving 
the central server's bandwidth burden. Even with many 
simultaneous downloads, the upload burden on the central server 
remains quite small, since each new downloader introduces new 
upload capacity.

Windows web browser support is added by running an installer. 
A prebuilt one is available, but instructions for building it 
yourself are in BUILD.windows.txt

Instructions for Unix installation are in INSTALL.unix.txt

Instructions for trackerless operation are in TRACKERLESS.txt.

To start hosting -

1) start running a tracker

First, you need a tracker. If you're on a dynamic IP or otherwise 
unreliable connection, you should find someone else's tracker and 
use that. Otherwise, follow the rest of this step.

Trackers refer downloaders to each other. The load on the tracker 
is very small, so you only need one for all your files.

To run a tracker, execute the command bttrack.py Here is an example -

./bttrack.py --port 6969 --dfile dstate

--dfile is where persistent information is kept on the tracker across 
invocations. It makes everything start working again immediately if 
you restart the tracker. A new one will be created if it doesn't exist 
already.

The tracker must be on a net-addressible box, and you must know the 
ip number or dns name of it.

The tracker outputs web logs to standard out. You can get information 
about the files it's currently serving by getting its index page. 

2) create a torrent file using btmaketorrent.py

To generate a torrent file, run btmaketorrent and give it the file
you want a torrent for and the url of the tracker

./btmaketorrent.py myfile.ext http://my.tracker:6969/announce

This will generate a file called myfile.ext.torrent

Make sure to include the port number in the tracker url if it isn't 80.

(You may also use btmaketorrent.py to create trackerless torrents. See
the file TRACKERLESS.txt for information about trackerless operation.)

This command may take a while to scan over the whole file hashing it.

The /announce path is special and hard-coded into the tracker. 
Make sure to give the domain or ip your tracker is on instead of 
my.tracker.

You can use either a dns name or an IP address in the tracker url.

3) associate .torrent with application/x-bittorrent on your web server

The way you do this is dependent on the particular web server you're using.

You must have a web server which can serve ordinary static files and is 
addressable from the internet at large.

4) put the newly made .torrent file on your web server

Note that the file name you choose on the server must end in .torrent, so 
it gets associated with the right mimetype.

5) put up a static page which links to the location you uploaded to in step 4

The file you uploaded in step 4 is linked to using an ordinary url.

6) start a downloader as a resume on the complete file

You have to run a downloader which already has the complete file, 
so new downloaders have a place to get it from. Here's an example -

./btdownloadheadless.py --url http://my.server/myfile.torrent --saveas myfile.ext

Make sure the saveas argument points to the already complete file.

If you're running the complete downloader on the same machine or LAN as 
the tracker, give a --ip parameter to the complete downloader. The --ip 
parameter can be either an IP address or DNS name.

BitTorrent defaults to port 6881. If it can't use 6881, (probably because 
another download is happening) it tries 6882, then 6883, etc. It gives up 
after 6889.

7) you're done!

Now you just have to get people downloading! Refer them to the page you 
created in step 5.

BitTorrent can also publish whole directories - simply point 
btmaketorrent.py at the directory with files in it, they'll be published 
as one unit. All files in subdirectories will be included, although files 
and directories named 'CVS' and 'core' are ignored.

If you have any questions, try the web site:

http://www.bittorrent.com/

If you find a bug, please report it to:

bugs at bittorrent.com

