Core-based Reconfiguration for Reliable Overlay Networks

In P2P overlay networks, the continual arrival and departure of nodes leads to the necessity of running periodically a specific reconfiguration algorithm able to renew the overlay. This paper presents a new reconfiguration mechanism for overlay networks. The algorithm exploits a characteristic observed in many overlay networks: the presence of a core composed by reliable nodes (nodes that never leave the overlay). Even if members of the core are a-priori unknown, the algorithm is able to eventually select one of them that will carry out the periodic renewing of the overlay. Once the reconfiguration is performed by a core node, the overlay will never lose its reliability, letting any query, issued from this time on, be ever satisfied.