My stack of peer-to-peer (P2P)-related books is getting higher and higher. When I see yet another title of this kind, I wonder if it is still possible to present it another way. Well, the authors show in their 300-plus-page book that it is, at least if the reader is rather interested in inventing applications of this type and doing research on them.

After an introductory chapter, chapter 2 presents a taxonomy of P2P architectures, along with a short description of representatives for different groups. Chapters 3 and 4 deal with the basic functionality of P2P networks (routing of searching information), while the later chapters focus on more advanced queries. Chapter 5 describes basic methods for quality provisioning adjusted for the P2P context, that is, load balancing and replication. Then, chapter 6 presents a sketch of security issues. P2P applications are usually associated with social behaviors; chapter 7 considers this, showing methods to improve trust management by using reputation systems. Chapter 8 is devoted to the creation of P2P systems. Chapter 9 presents various issues related to some existing or proposed P2P networks, details of their operation, and possible applications (such as backups or Web caching). The book concludes with a broad summary, references, and an index.

The book is most suitable for researchers and theoreticians, as the issues described focus mainly on some interesting proposals that exist mostly in papers, not in practice (the only disadvantage I see is the fact that they are not strictly partitioned). However, there are many portions that describe popular existing applications. This proves that the overlay field is now quite mature.