Thanks for this info., Lord. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but programs such as LW are referred to as "clients", yes? Let's see if I can get to the heart of it as a layperson here. I realize I may be dreaming as far as finding a client that can do these things, but my priorities are:

(1) A client that pulls from the broadest range of sources available "out there" on the internet, over-and-above from other LW/FW users, whenever running a search for anything.
(2) Automatically finding, and re-establishing a connection with (each time the client is reopened) sources so as to make it possible to download files completely.
(3) Effectively resuming & completing downloads already in-progress from previous sessions, no matter how many times the client is reopened.
(4) Saving searches run, and the results from them again, session to session, so new searches don't have to be run each time you reopen the client (you can, of course, still run new searches each time, if you wish).
(5) No built-in limits, e.g., as mentioned before about LW v4.18.8 where there is a vertical size limit to the search results window pane.

Also, a question about LW's "Out-Of-Band" searching checkbox option: Does OOB searching cause LW to look elsewhere than other LW/FW users to pull in search results?

Ultimately, is there a program/client currently available that offers the 5 priorities I listed above - all in one? If not, which one is THE client that offers the most among them, and, which ones does it offer?

Thanks for any clarity you can offer, and for any input anyone else on the forum might contribute.

Hello? (chirp, chirp, chirp) Hello??

Sorry for the delay, I became distracted and forgot.

Yes, clients = different programs.

A client developer would be the best one to point these questions to.

1. I suspect all clients are about the same in the regard of search horizon. This is due to the way the gnutella protocol was designed. The later developed clients incorporated the ability to search outside the immediate horizon. This would include LimeWire clones, Phex, GTK-Gnutella. Not sure about ShareAza because it only has a basic gnutella ability which has not been upgraded very often in the past several years. BearShare 5 I am also not sure about, it was an advanced client during its days. But that was 6 years ago before BearShare was sold and moved to a different network (a semi-commercial network under the RIAA's indirect control.)

2. Questions 2 and 3 are very similar.
I suspect most clients are similar in that they attempt to connect to what were the known peers who had the file at the time the file was initially downloaded. If those persons are not online then ...or if they are too busy uploading to others ... and that's usually a huge part of the problem.

If you are referring to an auto-search function. I am not sure if any client has this ability. I recall in the very early days of the network, one client had a similar ability but was put into line by the other gnutella developers due to the massive network traffic it was causing with its behaviour. Even the attempt to auto-connect to the hosts of the incomplete downloads is only done in intervals of every 30-60 minutes. LW and Phex do this. Again, not sure about the other clients.

4. As previously mentioned, I suspect a few clients have the ability to 'save' search terms between sessions, but I am not sure about search results. I might be wrong but I thought Phex had something almost close to what you mean. But I confess I have not used Phex for searching and downloading since early in the year. Only times I've had Phex open since I was simply sharing files.

5. What you experienced with LW 4.18 I have not seen happen. Unless I misunderstood the situation where you were unable to scroll to the bottom of the search results. That seems odd. I am wondering that if you had have temporarily stretched the program's dimensions lower and wider a little bit, if that might have overcome that quirky behaviour. The only other thing I can think of is the search results at the lowest part were auto-designated as spam, and you have LW's settings set to hide spam from search results.

I do not think I really answered your questions well. But I do have limited knowledge. To look for the 'ideal' client. I think each client has things that are better than the others or the others do not have, but there seems to be none that have the best of them combined into one.

For example, I like how BearShare 5 shows how many shares and what approximate total file size of shares of the peers it's connected to. Phex also has this ability, though I suspect BS is more aggressive about obtaining the information. The history of searches, something I think both GTK and Phex have can be handy. Phex keeps a history of your uploads. I liked the direct connect tool and the advanced file description tools of LW 4. I like LW's drag and drop option for adding files or folders to shares which seems to be an ability other clients do not seem to possess. There will be other things I like about particular clients but cannot think of them at the moment.

OK - NOW WHAT? I downloaded and installed a number of Microsoft Updates a couple of days ago - nothing unusual at all - just a few security updates for Windows XP and Word. I've got Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 32-bit O.S. on my PC. Gotten MS updates like those plenty of times before. Suddenly, however, Limewire 4.18.8 will not connect anymore. Tried resetting all of its defaults, tried letting it reset to listening from a different port, tried restarting. Nothing. It opens, but won't connect. I've had the version of the Norton Internet Security suite package you get from being a Comcast/Xfinity customer, which I've been using since 2008, and that's never gotten in LW's way. So, obviously, I assume these new MS updates changed something in and/or for LW. I'm no tech guy - so I really don't know what's going on here. LW 4.18.8 has been connecting immediately upon opening up to now. What do I have to do to get it connecting again? Thanks!

Did you try one of the Connectfix installers?
Always for LW 4 versions to connect on my particular computer I had to disable TLS in the performance section of Advanced settings of LW's options & tools menu. See if this helps.
Yours is the first report I have seen of any issue with recent MS updates.

Thanks for replying, Lord. Magically, of course right after I put up my post about this yesterday, I opened LW again and it connects now. It's fully connected as I write this. So, no idea what the issue was with it. But, so I know a little more here: What are ConnectFix installers, where do you get them, and how do they work? What does disabling TLS, and either of the other checkboxes under that option, do? Also, I continue to have OOB searching enabled at your suggestion. I assume that provides for locating a broader range of sources that you can connect to when running searches? The main issue I'm frustrated about is that LW 4.18.8 will practically NEVER resume a download in-progress after you close LW down for any reason while that download remains incomplete. This applies to any download, no matter how much of it has already come in. With LW Pirate Edition which, unless it's changed, won't run right using the new Java 7 RTE, running new, related searches jumpstarted some downloads into resuming before. LW 4.18.8 just doesn't seem to be helped along to complete its downloads no matter what. There has been stuff that's incomplete that I'd really like to have finish and save. Any other ideas - from you or anyone else - about how to resume incompletes? Any further news about LPE being able to run with Java 7 and newer JRE's yet? Thanks again.

The ConnectFix installers install a fresh list of hosts to connect to. At least a percentage of them are reliable hosts and will be online (whether they have spare slots to connect to is the question.) But in theory, you only need to connect to a single host. If the host does as it should, it should pass information to your LW about hosts it has detected as being online during its session. Hopefully you connect to some of these hosts. The connectfix installer replaces any older connection file you have. I collate the host data myself from checking connection windows of LW or Phex and seeing which ones connect the longest and also have static addresses.

I do not know why disabling TLS should help with connecting, but seems to work for some people's systems or versions of LW. TLS is supposed to help provide more secure file-transfers. By secure I mean I think they are semi-encrypted.
I do not know much about the Mojito DHT. According to Wikipedia, "The DHT is replacing search by SHA-1, when locating alternate sources for a known file or looking for push-proxies."
Running as Ultrapeer means you help others connect to the network. With LW you will connect to 32 other peers and 40 leafs. There is a small over-head of bandwidth running as UP. Approximately 10 KB/s or a little less. Some persons prefer to connect purely as leafs so they can maintain all the bandwidth.

LW 4.18 I will not say I especially liked. I preferred LW 4.16 or 4.14 with 4.14 being my favorite. LW 4.18 was the first version to change the location of the downloads.dat file which keeps a record of all your incomplete downloads. Previously this file was found in your incomplete folder.

Most people found that when downgrading from LW 5, LW 4.16 or earlier were more successful at continuing previous incomplete downloads. LW 4.18 on the other hand seems to almost ignore them and will not recognise they are incomplete files when you do searches (ie: same file shows in search results but LW 4.18 will not indicate that you are already downloading that file.)

If you wish to try 4.16 then see http://www.gnutellaforums.com/downlo...downloads.html which will show the process to move the downloads file to the incomplete folder. And then how to resume the downloads.

As for resuming incomplete downloads in general, re-searching the original file topic, and doing variations on this. Search results are usually better the longer your LW has been running. One thing you can try with LW 4 is pausing downloads then resuming. Or using the technique used in the link above. This is something you cannot do with LW 5.

Thanks so much for this Lord, especially focusing on resuming the downloads of incompletes as the main issue. Some commitments from you here, though, please: 1. Ultrapeer means helping others connect to the network, yes? Is that entirely for others' benefit, or does it also help your own LW user experience in some way(s)? 2. Does checking the "disable Ultrapeer" box in the options free up your LW client to do the broadest searching for reliable sources and for files, and successfully complete downloads, including resuming incompletes whenever you shut down and restart your PC? 3. How does OOB searching fit in to this? 4. Also, you said you prefer LW 4.16, but that 4.14 is your favorite. So, which one? 4.16 or 4.14, instead of 4.18. Thanks again!

1. U.P.'s assist others to connect to the network yes. Ultrapeer mode should not have any ill effects upon searching. For me I find it is the contrary. I find I seem to get better (more) search results and less spam when acting as an ultrapeer. For example, as a Leaf I tend to get 30-50 search results or less for a particular search term. When in U.P. mode, I tend to get 50-80 or more.
2. I do not think disabling UP will have any effect on searching for many people, but it might help for some who have limited bandwidth. When I was on ADSL-1, I preferred connecting as a Leaf due to my limited bandwidth. Now on ADSL-2, I prefer ultrapeer mode.
3. OOB means out-of-bounds, meaning outside of the regular search horizon that a standard search would be able to reach. So utilising OOB should assist with finding files, most particularly rare files.
4. I am not sure what improvements were made to 4.16 over 4.14. I only started using 4.16 because I misplaced my 4.14 installer when I purchased a new computer. My particular 4.16.6 version was a little buggy, but 4.16.7 would probably be fine. For me at least, even now every second time I open 4.14 it immediately jumps into ultrapeer mode, more often than my LPE does. My LPE usually needs to wait an hour or few hours before shifting into U.P. mode. Toss a coin. One thing you will notice with LW 4.16 or 4.14 is they will connect to earlier versions of LW 4, versions that LW 4.18 was designed not to connect to. LW 5 versions were also designed not to connect to pre-LW 4.14 versions, but LPE 5.6.2 does have the ability to connect to earlier LW 4 versions.

It sounds like 4.16.6 should be avoided (buggy) for 4.14 or 4.16.7 instead, but sounds like you haven't had the opportunity yet to give 4.16.7 a try personally. LPE, and all version 5's, is out for me as I'm not interested in hassling with workarounds for the Java 7 incompatibility problem. I think, unless you have more to say about choosing between version 4's, especially when it comes to resuming incomplete downloads when shutting down and starting up my PC each time, I'll go with 4.14, especially given it jumps right into UP mode on startup. It sounds like going for a version older than that would not work out, as well as anything newer than 4.16.7. Per your experiences, I'll leave UP and OOB enabled. Will consider disabling TLS only if connectivity issues come up. I thought all the ".exe" installers for older versions of LW were available on the Gnutella archived-versions webpage. You should be able to get 4.14's installer file from there, if you too would like to run 4.14 instead 4.16. Thanks again. Your responses are both very helpful and educational, especially since the webpages that used to exist for LW are closed down now, so there is no educating oneself that way.