Patent ID: 7770168

Claim:
A method of efficiently distributing software to nodes within a network group, comprising: determining from a first node within a network group whether any other node within the network group previously downloaded, or is currently downloading, specified software from a server, the server being outside the network group, wherein a download log is maintained for each node within the network group, and wherein determining whether a particular node previously downloaded, or is currently downloading, the specified software comprises querying the download log for that node; if the specified software was previously downloaded from the server to a second node within the network group, transferring the specified software from the second node to the first node; if a node that previously downloaded the software cannot be identified, then: determining whether any other node within the network group has requested the specified software, wherein a request log is maintained for each node within the network group, and wherein determining whether a particular node has requested the specified software comprises querying the request log for that node; designating a node within the network group to download the specified software from the server, wherein any of the nodes within the network group may be selected as the designated node; downloading the specified software from the server to the designated node; and transferring the specified software from the designated node to the first node if the designated node is not the first node.