[Computerbank] Re: [labf] jigdo - for d/l isos

[bob parker]

On Thu, 9 Oct 2003 23:42, Daniel O'Connor wrote:
> On Thursday 09 October 2003 21:58, Romana Challans wrote:
> > from the howto ( http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Debian-Jigdo/index.html ):
> > Abstract
> > Getting Debian ISOs has always been a painful, slow and supremely
> > inefficient process. Jigdo is a new tool for obtaining Debian ISOs in an
> > easy, fast and very efficient manner. This HOWTO describes why you
> > should use jigdo, a little bit about how it works and how you use it to
> > get and update Debian ISOs.
> > Jigdo is a very general tool, and isn't tied specifically to Debian
> > ISOs. The jigdo tools can be used to make any ISO available for download
> > in the same easy, fast and efficient manner they're used for Debian
> > ISOs. This HOWTO will cover this as well, but we'll focus primarily on
> > downloading Debian ISOs.
>
> Err bit torrent?!
> Pretty sure you can get them that way pretty quickly..

No, bittorrent is about taking the load off the server by using the download 
clients as servers as well. Similar to kazaa. You still have to download the 
entire iso. Moreover if you are on any of the ripoff Telstra plans you get to 
pay for what's uploaded from your box as well.

OTOH Jigdo is about downloading and patching only the differences in the iso.
For example I upgraded my debian 3.0_r0 to 3.0_r1 7 cd set for a cost of 138 
meg download, plus some jigdo overhead. So jigdo also takes some load off the 
servers, but by reducing the download traffic overall.

Bob