Distributed File Storage System
We're building a distributed file storage system in Go that operates on a peer-to-peer architecture, eliminating the need for centralized servers. The system allows multiple nodes to communicate directly with each other using TCP connections to store, retrieve, and share file chunks across the network. Each node in the network can act as both a client and server, contributing storage space while also accessing files stored on other peers.
The implementation leverages Go's concurrency features, particularly sync.RWMutex for thread-safe operations that allow multiple concurrent read operations while ensuring exclusive write access. This is crucial for maintaining data integrity when multiple goroutines are accessing shared resources like file metadata or peer connection information. The system is designed to be fault-tolerant through redundancy - files are broken into chunks and distributed across multiple nodes, so if one node goes offline, the data remains accessible from other peers.
Key features include decentralized storage without single points of failure, efficient TCP-based communication between peers, concurrent file operations using Go's synchronization primitives, and the ability to scale horizontally by adding more nodes to the network. This architecture is commonly used in systems like BitTorrent and modern blockchain networks, providing resilience and distributed load sharing across all participating nodes.