Tribler is an

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

BitTorrent BitTorrent is a Protocol (computing), communication protocol for peer-to-peer file sharing (P2P), which enables users to distribute data and electronic files over the Internet in a Decentralised system, decentralized manner. The protocol is d ...

client which allows anonymous peer-to-peer by default. Tribler is based on the BitTorrent protocol and uses an overlay network for content searching. Due to this overlay network, Tribler does not require an external website or indexing service to discover content. The user interface of Tribler is very basic and focused on ease of use instead of diversity of features. Tribler is available for

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

, and

OS X macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

. Tribler has run trials for a video streamer known as SwarmPlayer.

History

The name Tribler stems from the word ''tribe'', referring to the usage of

social networks A social network is a social structure consisting of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), networks of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of meth ...

in this P2P client. The first version of Tribler was an enhancement of ''ABC'' aka ''Yet Another BitTorrent Client''. In 2009, the development team behind Tribler stated that their efforts for the coming years were focused on the integration of Tribler with television hardware. In 2014, with the release of version 6.3.1, a custom built-in

onion routing Onion routing is a technique for anonymous communication over a computer network. In an onion network, messages are encapsulated in layers of encryption, analogous to the layers of an onion. The encrypted data is transmitted through a series o ...

network was introduced as part of Tribler. Users can load any clearnet torrent, and by leaving the box for anonymity ticked, the files will be routed through other Tribler. Because the custom onion network does not use Tor exit nodes, it is enhanced to make every Tribler user to function as a relay.

Features

Tribler adds keyword search ability to the

file download protocol using a gossip protocol, somewhat similar to the eXeem network which was shut down in 2005. The software includes the ability to recommend content. After a dozen downloads the Tribler software can roughly estimate the download taste of the user and recommends content. This feature is based on collaborative filtering, also featured on websites such as Last.fm and Amazon.com. Another feature of Tribler is a limited form of social networking and donation of upload capacity. Tribler borrows bandwidth capacity from connected nodes regarded as helpful to boost the download speed of files.

SwarmPlayer

The SwarmPlayer is a Python-based BitTorrent Internet TV viewer. It allows one to watch BitTorrent-hosted peer-to-peer digital media distribution of

video on demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos, television shows and films Digital distribution, digitally on request. These multimedia are accessed without a traditional video playback device and a typica ...

and plays live Tribler

streaming media Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a Computer network, network for playback using a Media player (disambiguation), media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of Network packet, packets from a Server (computing), ...

. It is based on the same core as the Tribler TV application. The core software is

free and open source software Free and open-source software (FOSS) is software available under a Software license, license that grants users the right to use, modify, and distribute the software modified or not to everyone free of charge. FOSS is an inclusive umbrella term ...

based on the Tribler platform, licensed under the

LGPL The GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) is a free-software license published by the Free Software Foundation (FSF). The license allows developers and companies to use and integrate a software component released under the LGPL into their own ...

2.1.

Development

Tribler was created by university researchers at the

Delft University of Technology The Delft University of Technology (TU Delft; ) is the oldest and largest Dutch public university, public Institute of technology, technical university, located in Delft, Netherlands. It specializes in engineering, technology, computing, design, a ...

, who are trying to improve peer-to-peer technology. Tribler is designed to enhance

by removing the need for central elements such as the websites for finding content, as well as being anonymous. The European Union's P2P-Next project to develop an Internet television distribution standard builds on Tribler technology.

Reception

After a news article on

TorrentFreak __NOTOC__ TorrentFreak (TF) is a blog dedicated to reporting the latest news and trends on the BitTorrent protocol and file sharing, as well as on copyright infringement and digital rights. The website was started in November 2005 by a Dutchma ...

in February 2012 mentioned Tribler's decentralization and the fact that its index is impossible to take down, the website became hugely popular, causing it to be reduced to just the download page to satisfy demand. A warning about Tribler security appeared on the tor-dev mailing list on Dec. 20, 2014 and was addressed shortly thereafter via GitHub.. Daniel Aleksandersen has pointed out in 2021 some privacy concerns due to the project's goals and priorities. He considers these issues are still not addressed in 2023.

References

External links

* {{Portal bar, Free and open-source software, Internet, Television * Free file sharing software Free BitTorrent clients Free software programmed in Python Streaming television BitTorrent clients for Linux File sharing software that uses wxWidgets Software that was ported from GTK to Qt Software that uses Qt Onion routing