A Churn Model Based On The Global Geographical Distribution of Nodes

2010 Ninth International Symposium on Distributed Computing and Applications to Business, Engineering
and Science
A churn model based on the global geographical distribution of

nodes
Qiuming Luo1, Yun Li1,Wentao Dong1 National

High Performance Computing Center College of
Computer Science and Software Engineering 1Shenzhen
University, China lqm@szu.edu.cn

Abstract—The dynamics of peer participation, or churn, is critical
for design, implementation and evaluation of Peer-to-peer (P2P)
systems. The metrics used to characterize the churn is distributions
of the node session lengths and arrival intervals. The prior studies
setup the model by measuring the historical logs or records, and
treat the churn as one whole black-box without understanding the
inside of peer’s population. We investigate churn in another point
of view, and find that modeling it based on the global geographical
distribution of peer nodes will result in a system which behave in
the way compliant to the measurement taken by previous works.
By this model, we do see some more future things than other
models. We might expect or predict when and what nodes would
return back, as well as when and what nodes would disappear at
high possibility. So it is useful when designing a system optimized
both to the pass and the future, which could reduce the overhead of
the maintenance of underlying overlay network of DHTs and lower
the redundant level of replications for P2P storage system.
Keywords: Churn; Model; Global Churn Pattern;

Peer-to- peer;DHT;
I. INTRODUCTION A peer joins the

system when a user starts the P2P application, contributes
some resources while making use of the resources provided
by others, and leaves the system when the user exits the
application. Such join-participate- leave cycle is defined as a
session. The independent arrival of peers creates the
collective effect is call churn. That dynamics of peer’s
participation affect P2P system dramatically.
Given the cooperative nature of P2P networking,
intermittent connectivity may lead to severe performance
degradation. Excessive overhead, required to maintain the
DHT structure and resolve inconsistencies in routing table,
may lead to the collapse of system. Some studies aim to
handling high churn rate in DHT and providing the
searching or locating operations correctly with lower
maintenance bandwidth [1]. As file-sharing system is
concerned, where availability is one of the research focuses,
it’s very critical to handle churn effectively to be practical.
Many works contributes to efficient replica maintenance for
978-0-7695-4110-5/10 $26.00 © 2010 distributed storage system [2][3] under churn.
IEEE DOI 10.1109/DCABES.2010.55
However, handling churn relies on a proper model
XiaoHui Lin1, 2 Sate Key Laboratory of Networking and accurate characterizing. Towards this end, researchers
and Switching Technology 2Beijing University of and developers require an accurate model of churn in order
to
Posts and Telecommunications Corresponding
draw accurate conclusions about peer-to-peer systems. The
Author: Xiaohui Lin xhlin@szu.edu.cn metrics of some models used to characterize the churn are
distributions of the node session lengths and arrival intervals for world-wide distributed systems, which considering the
[1][4]. Other models might use the probability of a peer uneven node distribution and their cyclic behavior, along
depart from the network during a unit of time, or use MTTF with the former metrics of arrival intervals and session
(mean time to failure) [3], for different purpose. Accurately lengths. On this basis, some optimize of applications could
characterizing churn requires precise and unbiased be fulfilled by foreseeing the peer population decrease or
information about the arrival and departure of peers, which increase. We study the number of networked computers of
is challenging to acquire. more than 200 countries, which covers the most of our
Without explicitly understanding the inside of peer’s planet, and provide a primary uneven distribution of different
population, the prior studies setup that model by measuring time zones. Then we describe their behavior by
the historical logs or records, and treat the churn as one multi-Gaussian, and get the arrival intervals and session
whole black-box. The peers are distributed around the world length distribution that compliant to the measurement
unevenly, those networked computers are turn on and off reported. And we proposed some possible usages of this
periodically, and so is the joining and leaving the global model and metrics in the end.
wide-area peer-to-peer storage. They are not completely
II. THE GLOBAL CHURN PA
TTERN Other than
“independent”. The previous studies showed fluctuations in
neglecting the uneven distribution and thinking the peers are
network size correlated with the time of day [5]. From a
completely independent, the new model, “Global Churn
global view, it is like the sun-shined area shift around the
Pattern” (GCP), takes those two factors into account and
earth as the earth rotation. Because of this cyclic behavior
model the individual peer similar to the previous studies.
and the uneven distribution of computers across the world,
the online computer number is varying from time to time
during the 24 hours in a day. 4
From this point of view, we provide a prototype model
A. Churn framework
The number of peer alive in Global Churn Pattern m odel is used to describe the amount of participated nodes at a
given time and denoted as )tN partici ( .
tN partici
( () ) = = ⎧ ⎨⎩∑ i n = timeatoffisinodeif
i ( ) (
0 ( tAlive
( () ) ) ( (1)

)
t ) tAlivei t ,1 isinodeif "on" timeat ,0
node i i s “on” at time t, if and only if “t > begin_of_sessionsession_lengthindependent, and i”. i and t A
"" (2) A ll
those n they are grouped < begin_of_sessionnodes are not completely i into
several crowds +
depend on time zone of their locations in our planet. The nodes in same crowd act much similarly than the nodes in
tN
other crowds. Then equation () = ∑ 32
partici
= 0
Alive t (3)
∑ ( (1) is rewritten () ) into equation (3):
= nz)(i 0 zi , ∑32
)( (4)
0z =nzn = The nodes are explicitly divided in to 24 c rowds and n(z)|(z=0,1,2,...,23) can describe the uneven
distribution of peer population. The nodes in same time zone are “correlated”, because they conform to the same
statistics characteristics. Besides those identical statistics characteristics, they act independently as many individuals.
B. Uneven distribution of peers
As it is pointed out that the availability of an individual host in P2P network is governed not only by failures, but
more importantly by user decisions to connect to or disconnect from the network. And all those decision are made
during the working time of the P2P users. Most people begin to work in the morning and stop working at some time
in the afternoon. But “morning” differs from 0 to 23 hours for peoples in different time zones. That is why we study
how many networked computers are there in different time zones. Although it is not accurate, we count the internet
users or Internet-ed
computer number over a list of more than 200 counties after searching the internet by Google,
according to their time zones.
Figure 1. shows the uneven distribution of potential peers across the world. It is reasonable that there nearly blank in
the ocean areas, where the Pacific ocean is corresponding to time zone of East-11 to West-9 and the Atlantic ocean is
corresponding to West-1 to West-2 roughly. The remaining areas are covered by continent and so there are many
Internet-ed computers. Moreover, it can be said that the Internet-ed computers are divided into three clusters which
have their peak center location at Eastern Asia, Western Europe and America. For the first glance, the node numbers
change sharply from one time zone to another. But, it is much smoother because the users must not participate and
depart strictly according the time zone. It is explained in next section.
242
x 108
3.5
internet users per timezone
3
s resut enretnif or ebmune h 2 1

t2.5 1.5
0
0.5
-15 -10 -5 0 5 10 15 timezone from GMT-11 to GMT+12
Figure 1. Internet-ed computers’ distribution all over the world.
C. Peer’s Cyclic behavior
The users of various P2P applications may demonstrate different behavior. So let us narrow our field to the typical
application of file sharing. If it is for work, the users will begin a session in working time of morning or afternoon,
during the daytime. If it is for entertainment, the users are likely to begin their session after diner. And some
application might make the users to begin their sessions in both daytime and nighttime.
As mention above, the users in same time zone behave alike. To put it simple, the user sessions of same time zone for
particular applications are following a normal (or Gaussian) distribution. Then, the density function of distribution for
the beginning of session can be expressed by equation (5).
()
1
( 2
σ
2
)2
2σπ
xf
tpx −
e
z = , where z=(0,1,...,23) ( 5)
Assuming tp equates to 12:00 am and σ=2 hours, 95% users

are covered in the working time of 9 am to 4 pm.
To make it more accurate, we might use two weighted Gaussians to distinguish the session begin in the morning and
afternoon. Equation (5) is rewritten into equation (6).
()() ()
2
wxf
222
1
z = 1 1
2 2σπ tpx −
e
21 2
w
+ 2
e
21 σπ tpx − 2
σ , where
z=(0,1,...,23) , w1+w2=1. (6) For example, am, tp2 =3:30 pm it

and is
reasonable σ1=
σ1=1
hour, set
to
wwhich
1=w2=0.5, 10:30 f or 1/2 users begin their session in the morning and 1/2 users in the afternoon. I f we fix
stands tp1 =
the session time to 1 hour for simplicity then we can see the expected fluctuation, which reach to the peak of 3.1x108
and to the bottom of 0.5x108 as Figure 2. -(a) shows. The potential peer numbers of that case in 24 hours in a day can
be drawn as Figure 2. -(a). Actually, not all the nodes would begin the session, so it should be decreased by multiply
a positive factor which is little than 1.
We also can rewrite the equation (6) to equation (7), so it can cover the nighttime. It is reasonable wp otential 3=0.2,
tppeer 1=
10:00 numbers am, in h ours pm in
tp2 =3:00 24 and a day tpto 3=9:00 can
set be w1=wdrawn pm. 2=
0.4, The
as Figure 2. -(b)
()
( ) ( ) ,
1
( ) 22 2 2 1
21
23
tpx tpx z
w
e − − wxf
=
1
+
1
2σπ
e 2
σ
+ w 2
1
2σπ e 2
σ 2 2 tpx −

2 3 σ
z=(0,1,...,23) σ
3 2 π
, w1+w2+w3=1. (7)
Figure 2. -(c) stands for the case of nighttime only, where we set Because tp3 =9:00pm.

of the different of application, the nodes number varies in different ways.

It is very clear that the fact of uneven distribution of nodes may cause the fluctuation of peer’s population. And with
the understanding of people’s daily behavior, the fluctuation would repeat day after day. But we should keep in mind
that user’s unpredictable decision/action will take great effects, too.
To make it more accurate, the session time should not be fixed to 1 hour. Median session times observed in deployed
networks range from as long as an hour to as short as few minutes. It is pointed out by [2] that session length are fit
by weibull or log-normal distributions, but not by exponential or Pareto. The users are classified into three groups in
[6], according to their “up” time. We could use exponential one for simplicity.
In GCP, all nodes are distributed around the world unevenly and grouped into 24 time zones. As one time zone is
considered, the individuals in this zone behave independently with their session beginnings obey Gaussian
distribution and their session lengths obey exponential distribution. All the nodes of 24 different time zones act
collectively and make the fluctuation of peer population periodically.
x 108
3.5
3
s edone niln 2 1
2.5 o 1.5
0
0.5
0 5 10 15 20 25 Greenwich Mean Time
(a)
243
x 108
2.5
2
s edone niln 1
o1.5
0
0.5
0 5 10 15 20 25 Greenwich Mean Time
(b)
4 x 108
3
3.5
s edone niln 0 2 1
o 0 5 10 15 20 25 2.5 1.5
0.5Greenwich Mean Time
(c)
Figure 2. Peer numbers at time of GMT-0 to GMT-23 for various cases of applications (a) for applications that will happen in the time from
morning to afternoon, (b) for those in the whole day. (c) for entertainment at night only.
III. EXPERIMENTAL EVALUATIONS Inter-arrival times obey the exponential (or Weibull) distribution according to the
measurement reported [4]. So, we take a simulation to evaluate our model. Considering two systems with 5000 and
10000 nodes respectively, the session begin times are recorded to measure the inter-arrival times. These nodes are
distributed to 24 time zones proportionally to the distribution of Figure-1. The measured intervals are counted and
drawn as Figure 3. We also make an exponential curve fitting. The fitting curve for Figure 3. -(a) is
y=453.53*exp(-0.099*x), and the fitting curve for Figure 3. - (b) is y=2052.7*exp(-0.214*x). These two cases are
both compliant to exponential distribution and backup our model strongly.
5000 nodes 600
measure value curve fitting 500
400
r ebmu
n300
200
100
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 interval(second)
(a)
10000 nodes 2000
measure value 1800
curve fitting
1600
1400
r ebmu
1200 n1000 800
600
400
200
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 interval(second)
(b)
Figure 3. Inter-arrival times distribution of a global distributed system. (a) of 5000 nodes. (b)10000 nodes.
We don’t take any experimental simulation to verify our model for session length, because it adopts exponential
session length distribution in our model and it is compliant to other existed models and measurements. What is more,
it is easy to adopt other session length distribution under GCP framework. IV. POTENTIAL APPLICATIONS OF GCP
The new model, named GCP, would affect some filed of P2P system in routing maintenance, neighbor selection, date
replication and search ways. If we can rebuild the metrics of GCP model for one P2P application from the
observations of system logs, then the peer population is somewhat predictable. Many storage systems based on DHT
would adjust their effort to repair the system according to the urgency of damage. The urgency of damage is
evaluated by counting the exist resource and compared to the limitation. The more damage occurs and the less
resource remains, the more effort is make to repair. As we can see in Figure 2. , the system should take harder effort
to repair when the resource (nodes) decrease. Then, most of the system will accumulate excessive redundant data of
replication when the time goes
244
forward from any valley of Figure 1. Because most system will maintain enough replicas in any time to ensure
adequate availability, so, from that time on, the replicas reintegrated into the system will increase as more nodes
rejoin. By knowing when the nodes amount will increase, the excessive redundant data could be avoided and reduce
the usage of bandwidth and storage. When the time goes forward from any peak of peer population, most system
would be busy to copy replicas due to the nodes departure rapidly, and might do harm to system availability. Using
GCP make it possible to prepare for that decreasing of population and maintain a higher availability.
It is possible to use GCP to predict the fluctuation of peer population and get more accurate control than those use
historical measurement as prediction. For the cases of routing maintenance, neighbor selection, and search ways, it is
similar to the case of replicas.
V. CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE WORK By combining the uneven geographical distribution of nodes and their cyclic
behavior, a new model is provided. It gives some more information than those models which treat the whole peer
population as a black-box. It is compliant to the measurement taken in previous works and might be correct for real
application. We also provide an application example for replication management of storage system based on DHTs.
There still many work should be done. The GCP model is coarse and should be refined. The users’ behavior can be
classified into some kinds other than simply modeling by Gaussian, such as to distinguish the servers that will be
online permanently from the home PCs that happen to used P2P applications. Besides that refining, we should figure
out a mechanism and real-time algorithm that is capable of rebuilding the GCP metric from the run-time records or
logs of P2P system. The most important work is to apply GCP in practice for performance optimization.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT This work was supported in part by the Fundamental Research Program of Guangdong Province
(Grant No. 2006B36430001), Foundation of Shenzhen City (Grant No. SG200810220145A and JC200903120069A),
National Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 60602066). The work has also got the support from Sate Key
Laboratory of Networking and Switching Technology (Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications) under
the Project number SKLNST-2009-1-8.
REFERENCES
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Kaashoek, M. F., Kubiatowicz, J., and Morris, R. 2006. “Efficient replica maintenance for distributed storage systems”. In Proceedings of the 3rd
Conference on Networked Systems Design &
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[5] J. Chu, K. Labonte, and B. N. Levine, "Availability and locality measurements of peer-to-peer file systems," in Proc. of ITCom: Scalability and Traffic
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2010 Ninth International Symposium on Distributed Computing and Applications to Business, Engineering