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[AudioBook Bay]

Torrent
A small metadata file which contains information about the data you want to download, not the data itself. It is downloaded from a web site (file extension is .torrent) by clicking on a download link. It can also be saved to your computer. This is useful if you want to be able to re-open the torrent later on without having to find the link again.

Bittorrent Client
A Bittorrent client is a computer program that manages downloads and uploads using the bittorrent protocol.

Peer
A peer is another computer on the internet that is sharing the file you wish to download. Typically a peer does not have the complete file, if it did it would be called a seed. Peers are also called leeches, to distinguish them from those who have completed their download and continue to leave their bittorrent client running and act as a seed.

Seed
A computer that has a complete copy of the specific torrent you are downloading. Once your client finishes downloading, it will remain open until you click the Finish button. This is known as seeding. You can also start a bittorrent client with a complete file, and once bittorrent client has checked the file it will connect and seed the file to others. It is good to continue seeding a file after you have finished downloading, to help others finish. Also, when a new torrent is posted to a tracker, someone must seed it in order for it to be available to others. The tracker doesn't know anything of the actual contents of a file, so it's important to follow through and seed a file if you upload the torrent to a tracker.

Tracker
Server on the Internet that coordinates the action of bittorrent clients. Upon opening a torrent, you contact the tracker and receive a list of peers to connect to. Throughout the transfer, your computer will query the tracker, telling it how much you've downloaded and uploaded and how much before finishing. If a tracker is down and you try to open a torrent, you will be unable to connect. If a tracker goes down during a torrent (you have already connected at some point and are already talking to peers), you will be able to continue transferring with those peers, but no new peers will be able to contact you. Tracker errors are often temporary, leave the client open and continue trying.