ΜTorrent

Infobox Software
name = µTorrent



caption = µTorrent 1.8 in Windows Vista
developer = BitTorrent, Inc.
released = initial release|2005|9|18
frequently_updated = yes
programming language = C++
operating system = Microsoft Windows
size = 260 kB
language = [http://utorrent.com/download.php 43 languages]
status = Active
genre = BitTorrent client
license = Freeware
website = http://www.utorrent.com/

µTorrent (or uTorrent and commonly abbreviated as "µT" or "uT") is a freeware BitTorrent client by BitTorrent, Inc. for Microsoft Windows written in C++ [ [http://www.utorrent.com/faq.php#How_can_.C2.B5Torrent_be_so_small_and_so_fast.3F FAQ Page: How can µTorrent be so small and so fast?] on http://www.utorrent.com/faq.php, the µTorrent FAQ page; accessed July 13, 2007.] . It gets the "µ" in its name from the SI prefix "micro" meaning one one-millionth and it refers to the program's small footprint. The program is designed to use minimal computer resources while offering functionality comparable to larger BitTorrent clients such as Vuze or BitComet.

The program has received consistently good reviews for its feature set, performance, stability, and support for older hardware and versions of Windows. A report showed that µTorrent was the most used BitTorrent client and the second most popular p2p application. [http://www.pcworld.com/article/144771/study_limewire_still_top_p2p_software_utorrent_2.html]

The program has been in active development since its first release in 2005. Although originally developed by Ludvig Strigeus, since December 7, 2006 the code is owned and maintained by BitTorrent, Inc.cite web
title = µTorrent and BitTorrent Join Forces
publisher = µTorrent.com forums
date = 2006-12-07
url = http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?id=17278
accessdate = 2006-12-08] . The code has also been employed by BitTorrent, Inc as the basis for version 6.0 of the BitTorrent client which makes that client a re-branded version of µTorrent.

History

Early development

Out of general discontent with bloatware, Serge Paquet suggested to Ludvig Strigeus that he make a small and efficient BitTorrent client. Strigeus began to conceptualize the plans for the program's development, which, at the time, did not include making the client feature-rich. After initially working on it for about a month during the autumn of 2004 (the first build is dated October 17, 2004), mostly during his free time before or after work, Strigeus ceased coding µTorrent for a year. He resumed work on September 15, 2005, and three days later, the first public release (version 1.1 beta) was made available as freeware, and began generating feedback.

Advertisements

In early versions, Strigeus had built in a web redirection via nanotorrent for search queries entered through the search bar that displayed advertisements in a frame on the web browser. Some users thought this suspicious because tracking could be implemented by recording the IP addresses of those downloading/receiving the advertisements, and the search functionality could easily be used to track user queries through whichever web-interface the client is going through to execute the search. After a short trial period, the advertising was disabled, mitigating possible concerns. [cite web | quote = There's no data collected, it's just used to display ads for certain keywords ... It was used as a domain instead of being integrated into the client so the ad thing could be turned off later easily if the response to it was negative. Also, it may be used in the future to provide a "search all sites" feature. | url = http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?pid=53755#p53755| title = Post by administrator "Firon" in thread "The search bypass nanotorrent.com" ]

A later version of the software has, instead of ads, a "search all sites" feature, which is a keyword-based search bar that delivers listings of torrent files at different trackers. A frame at the top displays advertisements (server-side) in the browser when the search function is used. In version 1.5, no ads are present in the program itself.

As of build 463, a redirect bypass feature became available in the Advanced options.

PeerFactor SARL

On March 4, 2006, PeerFactor SARL [ [http://www.peerfactor.fr/ PeerFactor SARL's] website.] announced the signing of a six-month contract with Strigeus for the development of "new content distribution applications on the Web." [ [http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1117 "uTorrent Sign Six Month PeerFactor Agreement"] by Michael Ingram, published by " [http://www.slyck.com/ Slyck News] " March 4, 2006.] PeerFactor SARL is a relatively new company formed by former employees of PeerFactor, which was a subsidiary of the French anti-piracy organization Retspan.

Ludde stated that his coding for PeerFactor SARL was to use his expertise at optimization of the BitTorrent protocol to create a .dll which PeerFactor SARL intended to use as part of a distribution platform for files in a corporate setting. [ [http://www.p2pnet.net/story/8158 "uTorrent, PeerFactor SARL deal"] by Alex H., published on P2Pnet on March 13, 2006; accessed April 18, 2006. The article recounts a December 2005 interview with Strigeus about the ramifications of the PeerFactor deal.] At the time there was some speculation that μTorrent may have been modified to spy on users on Peerfactor's behalf [ [http://www.p2pnet.net/story/8097 P2PNet - Bizarre uTorrent, PeerFactor deal] ] [ [http://www.slyck.com/story1117.html Slyck News - uTorrent sign six month PeerFactor agreement] ] , however to date (even following μTorrent's acquisition by BitTorrent, Inc.) no evidence has been produced to support these allegations.

Ownership change

On December 7, 2006, µTorrent was purchased by BitTorrent, Inc., as it was announced on their official forum. µTorrent will continue to have its own website and community for now, and the µTorrent code base will remain closed source. Ludvig Strigeus, the writer of µTorrent, will serve as a technical consultant, but BitTorrent, Inc. will do the majority of the development work. [ [http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-inc-buys-%C2%B5torrent/ BitTorrent Inc Buys uTorrent.] Torrentfreak.com. December 07, 2006.]

On September 18, 2007, BitTorrent 6.0 was released, which is a re-branded version of µTorrent. As a result, BitTorrent 6 is closed-source (unlike BitTorrent 5.x and before, which were open source software) and is currently only available for Windows.

Mac version

An Apple Macintosh version of µTorrent has been in the making for years [http://www.utorrent.com/faq.php#Is_there_a_Linux_or_Mac_version.3F] . On the 9th of September 2008 an alpha version was leaked onto The Pirate Bay. BitTorrent’s product development veep Simon Morris said to TorrentFreak:quote|“Apparently an internal development build of uTorrent for Mac has been leaked publicly. It has been referred to as an 'alpha' quality build. The unfortunate part is that we did not intentionally release this build and would strongly recommend folks not to use it as it isn’t yet complete or stable enough to be released to the public.” [http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/09/26/utorrent_mac_leak/]

Release history

Pronunciation

;"You" (u) or "Micro" (μ)The author of µTorrent wrote in 2005, "I usually say 'you torrent' because it looks like a u", and offered "microtorrent" and "mytorrent" as candidate pronunciations.> [http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?pid=47#p47 Post by Ludvig "ludde" Strigeus in thread "µTorrent Namesake"] on forum.utorrent.com, the official µTorrent forums; accessed April 18, 2006.> The symbol μ, which is actually the small Greek letter Mu, stands for the SI prefix "micro" meaning one one-millionth and refers to the program's small footprint.

Contributors

Original development was performed by Ludvig Strigeus ("ludde", from Sweden), the creator of µTorrent. Serge Paquet ("vurlix", from Canada) acted as release coordinator, and had intended to work on Linux and Mac OS X ports. He maintained the µTorrent website and forum up until the end of 2005, but is no longer affiliated with µTorrent.

Development after the purchase by BitTorrent is performed by developers Greg Hazel ("alus"), Arvid Norberg ("arvid", author of libtorrent), Jan Brittenson ("CodeRed"), Richard Choi ("rchoi") and Ryan Norton ("RyanNorton") at BitTorrent Inc. Strigeus remains as a technical consultant.

Other tasks continue to be performed by ongoing contributors. Giancarlo Martínez ("Firon", from Puerto Rico) maintains the µTorrent forums and FAQ. Carsten Niebuhr ("Directrix", from Germany) developed and maintains the µTorrent Web User Interface. Timothy Su ("ignorantcow", from Malaysia) is the designer of the current website.

Jason East (creative director) and Timothy Britt (senior designer) of [http://www.blackstripedesign.com Blackstripe] have been commissioned to design a new community website which will include the implementation of an idea/suggestion bank as well as other features which encourage dynamic interaction between the growing µTorrent user base and the developersFact|date=October 2008.

Features

Features present in µTorrent include:
* µTorrent can use as little as 14 MB of RAM running on a 486 processor on Windows 95. [ [http://www.utorrent.com/faq.php#What_are_.C2.B5Torrent.27s_system_requirements.3F µTorrent - The lightweight and efficient BitTorrent client - FAQ ] ]
* Unicode support for Windows 95/98/ME, avoiding use of the Microsoft Layer for Unicode which is several times larger than µTorrent.
* Teredo / IPv6 support.
* UPnP support for all versions of Windows, without needing Windows XP's UPnP framework.
* Protocol encryption (PE),
* Peer exchange (PEX) with other BitTorrent clients,
** libtorrent and clients based on it like Deluge have full µTorrent PEX support.
** Transmission and clients based on libTransmission have full µTorrent PEX support.
** KTorrent has full µTorrent PEX support as of 2.1 RC1.
** Vuze, formerly Azureus, has full support as of version 3.0.4.3
* RSS ("broadcatching").
* "Trackerless" BitTorrent support using DHT, compatible with the original BitTorrent client and BitComet.
* User configurable intelligent disk caching system.
* Full proxy server support.
* HTTPS tracker support.
* Configurable bandwidth scheduler.
* Localized for 38 languages. [ [http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?id=5778 Forum thread "Translation status"] on forum.utorrent.com; accessed April 20, 2006.]
* Initial seeding of torrents.
* Customizable search bar & user interface design [ [http://forum.utorrent.com/viewforum.php?id=6 Forum threads under "User Interface Design"] on forum.utorrent.com; accessed April 24, 2006]
* Configuration settings and temporary files are stored in a single directory, allowing portable use.
* WebUI - A plugin currently in beta testing that allows µTorrent running on one computer to be controlled from another computer, either across the internet or on a LAN, using a Web page.
* Embedded Tracker - a simple tracker designed for seeding torrents, lacking a web interface or list of hosted torrents. It is not designed for secure or large-scale application. [ [http://www.utorrent.com/faq.php#Does_.C2.B5Torrent_have_an_embedded_tracker.3F µTorrent FAQ - Answer about Embedded Tracker] ]

ize

µTorrent is shipped as a single stand-alone compressed executable file, and does not require installation, though an installer is available for trivial installation. Recent versions have included the ability to install themselves on first run. Small executable size is achieved by avoiding the use of many libraries, notably the C++ standard library and stream facilities, and creating substitutes written specifically for the program. The executable is then compressed to roughly half of its compiled and linked size using UPX.

Reception

μTorrent is praised for its small size and the minimal computer resources it uses which sets it apart from other clients. Commonly the only criticisms it faces are that it is Windows only and closed source. PC Magazine gave the program a positive review saying that it "packs an outstanding array of features". [cite web|url=http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1911890,00.asp |title=uTorrent Review|publisher="PC Magazine"|author=Patrick Norton|date=2006-11-06|accessdate=2008-09-20] and was also listed in their "Best free 157 software tools". [PC Magazine. Published 01-MAR-08.] It was also in PC World Magazines "101 Fantastic freebies". [PC World. Published 01-MAY-07] The Manila Standard Today said it is the "hands-down best utility for downloading large files in Windows". The website TorrentFreak.com said it was the most feature rich BitTorrent client available. [http://torrentfreak.com/bittorrent-client-comparison/] About.com said it was the best BitTorrent client available citing it's small size and minimal impact to the rest of your computer's speed. [http://netforbeginners.about.com/od/peersharing/f/torrentclients.htm/] Wired.com said its "memory footprint is also ridiculously small" [http://www.wired.com/software/softwarereviews/news/2006/10/71979] . The PC Authority magazine gave it a 6 out of 6 stars. [http://www.pcauthority.com.au/GroupTests/35845,labs-test-torrent-clients.aspx] Lifehacker.com has continued to rate it the best Bittorrent client available. [http://lifehacker.com/5052582/best-of-the-best-the-hive-five-winners] [http://lifehacker.com/5052582/best-of-the-best-the-hive-five-winners] CNET.com gave it a 5 out of 5 stars saying it is "Light and quick downloading". [http://www.download.com/uTorrent/3000-2196_4-10528327.html#editorsreview]

ee also

* Comparison of BitTorrent clients

References

External links

* [http://www.utorrent.com/ Official Website]
** [http://forum.utorrent.com/index.php µTorrent official forum]
** [irc://irc.p2p-network.net/utorrent Official IRC Channel]
* [http://www.zeropaid.com/news/6184/uTorrent+-+A+Beginner's+guide+to+BitTorrent+downloading uTorrent: A Beginner's Guide to BitTorrent Downloading] by Jared M
* [http://p2pnet.net/story/6610 p2pnet uTorrent interview] by Alex H
* [http://p2pnet.net/story/8158 p2pnet uTorrent interview 2] by Alex H
* [http://slyck.com/news.php?story=1117 uTorrent Sign Six Month PeerFactor Agreement] by Michael Ingram
* [http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=153 Can great software live in 130 kilobytes?] by George Ou
* [http://www.zeropaid.com/utorrent uTorrent] on Zeropaid