CLIENT-SERVER VERSUS PEER-TO-PEER FILE SHARING
• FOR SHARING FILES OVER MOST SMALL NETWORKS, THERE ARE TWO ARCHITECTURES: CLIENT-SERVER AND PEER-TO-PEER.
• A CLIENT-SERVER ARCHITECTURE TENDS TO BE A PERMANENT SETUP, WHILE PEER-TO-PEER SHARING TENDS TO BE GENERALLY AD HOC.
• IN A TRUE CLIENT-SERVER ENVIRONMENT, THE PROCESSING IS SPLIT BETWEEN A CLIENT MACHINE AND A SERVER MACHINE .
• THE CLIENT SENDS A DATA PROCESSING REQUEST TO THE SERVER, WHICH HANDLES MOST OF THE DATA MANIPULATION.
• THE SERVER THEN SENDS THE UNFORMATTED RESULTS BACK TO THE CLIENT, WHICH HANDLES THE FORMATTING AND DISPLAY FOR THE END USER.
• THE BENEFIT OF SUCH AN ARRANGEMENT IS THAT THE SERVER, WHICH TENDS TO BE A MORE POWERFUL COMPUTER, HANDLES THE MORE DEMANDING DATA MANIPULATION TASKS. HOWEVER, THE SERVER DOESN'T NEED TO WASTE TIME FORMATTING THE RESULTS FOR OUTPUT.
• IN ADDITION, THE RAW RESULTS TYPICALLY REQUIRE LESS NETWORK
BANDWIDTH THAN DATA THAT HAVE BEEN FORMATTED FOR DISPLAY USING A GUI.
• THEREFORE, A CLIENT-SERVER ARRANGEMENT MINIMIZES NETWORK USAGE AND ALSO MAKES EFFICIENT USE OF HIGH-END SERVER RESOURCES.
