Peer-to-peer architectural patterns belong to the category of symmetric client-server patterns. Symmetric in this context refers to the fact that there is no need for a strict division in terms of client, server, and so on in the network of systems. In a peer-to-peer pattern, a single system acts as both client and server. Each system, also called a peer, sends requests to other peers in the network and at the same time receives and services requests from other peers, which are part of the network. This is a great difference when compared to a traditional client server network where a client must only send a request and wait for the server to process.
In general, this pattern is typically used to implement a decentralized ...
