Comparison of load balancing algorithms for structured peer-to-peer systems

Abstract

Among other things, Peer-to-Peer (P2P) systems are very useful for managing large amounts of widely distributed data. Distributed Hash Tables (DHT) offer a highly scalable and self-organizing approach for efficient and persistent distribution and retrieval of data. However the scalability and performance of DHTs is strongly based on an equal distribution of data across participating nodes. Because this concept is based on hash functions, one assumes that the content is distributed nearly evenly across all DHT-nodes. Nonetheless, most DHTs show difficulties in load balancing as we will point out in this paper. To ensure the major advantages of DHTs – namely scalability, flexibility and resilience – we discuss three approaches of load balancing and compare them corresponding to simulation results.