Distributed File system using block chain principle

eggdescrambler

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Quote from: WhatsUpFreak on January 29, 2014, 11:01:24 PM

The problem is that p2p is already possible for files without the blockchain and if you need verification for files you can place a hash into the current BTC protocol. I'm not an expert, but I cannot think of a purpose which the blockchain can serve in the instance of a distributed file system.

Yes, that's true. Thanks all

anti-scam

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COINECT

Quote from: WhatsUpFreak on January 29, 2014, 11:01:24 PM

The problem is that p2p is already possible for files without the blockchain and if you need verification for files you can place a hash into the current BTC protocol. I'm not an expert, but I cannot think of a purpose which the blockchain can serve in the instance of a distributed file system.

^

One of the key requirements of Bitcoin is establishing an objective order of transactions. For a file system it probably won't matter as much to people whether file A or file B came first as long as both are fully accessible. There would probably be other incongruities too between the needs of a currency and a file system. You'd need to establish all of them and reconcile them or you're just wasting efficiency.

WhatsUpFreak

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The problem is that p2p is already possible for files without the blockchain and if you need verification for files you can place a hash into the current BTC protocol. I'm not an expert, but I cannot think of a purpose which the blockchain can serve in the instance of a distributed file system.

eggdescrambler

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Quote from: WhatsUpFreak on January 29, 2014, 09:47:46 PM

The size of the blockchain would be a huge issue here.

Yes, but I imagine the fees as well, correspondingly.
Only the "miners" would store all, nodes would be storing the headers only, or specialized server (like the equivalent of blockchain.info) would only store the header, allowing to get the file from the miners.

The question is, would this distributed file system with its own block chain be useful in anyway?
I haven't come up with a specific need, I'm under the impression it would be useful for some type of service

WhatsUpFreak

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The size of the blockchain would be a huge issue here.

eggdescrambler

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Ok, this might have been proposed already, and I'm not sure how viable is the idea but I wanted to share it.
I see a few flaws in the story, but if there is anything there, someone might improve on it. Please share.

Imagine a separate network and block chain with a miners competing on the same proof of work principle to add new blocks.
However, instead of transactions added to those blocks, it would be files of various sizes with any content.
The files could be encrypted or could be unencrypted.
Each file will have a corresponding header identifying a title of some sort so it can be retrieved.
The miner who wins the proof of work gets the fees for the storage, but all miners store the block.

Nodes could add a file to the network but they will also need to pay bitcoins to the miners (say 1 satoshi per bytes or per 10 bytes...)
Perhaps the blocks could be deleted after a year, the miners only having to retain the last year of blocks.

Nodes could download the headers and search among the header for a specific content and download a specific file in a block once identified.

Benefit: large content stored in a block chain, with timestamp safely guarded

What is the value over BitTorrent? Well, for files that require some form of validation.

Topic: Distributed File system using block chain principle (Read 4973 times)