Databases, Information Systems, and Peer-to-Peer Computing

Peer-to-peer(P2P)computingiscurrentlyattractingenormousmediaattention, spurred by the popularity of ?le sharing systems such as Napster, Gnutella and Morpheus. In P2P systems a very large number of autonomous computing nodes (the peers) pool together their resources and rely on each other for data and services. The wealth of business opportunities promised by P2P networks has gene- ted much industrial interest recently, and has resulted in the creation of various industrial projects, startup companies, and special interest groups. Researchers from distributed computing, networks, agents and databases have also become excited about the P2P vision, and papers tackling open problems in this area have started appearing in high-quality conferences and workshops. Much of the recent research on P2P systems seems to be carried out by - search groups with a primary interest in distributed computation and networks. This workshop concentrated on the impact that current database research can have on P2P computing and vice versa. Although researchers in distributed data structures and databases have been working on related issues for a long time, the developed techniques are simply not adequate for the new paradigm.