Patent ID: 8307026

Claim:
A computer system for providing on-demand distributed storage in a peer-to-peer network, the computer system comprising: one or more processors, one or more computer-readable memories and one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices; program instructions, stored on at least one of the one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories, to communicate and share data of a first computer of a plurality of computers in the peer-to-peer network with one or more other computers of the plurality of computers in the peer-to-peer network; program instructions, stored on at least one of the one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories, to allocate an available storage unit on the first computer into a first storage unit and a second storage unit, wherein the first computer has an operating system; program instructions, stored on at least one of the one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories, to format the second storage unit so that the second storage unit is not visible to the operating system of the first computer; program instructions, stored on at least one of the one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories, to transmit, from the first computer to one or more other computers of the plurality of computers in the peer-to-peer network, an availability time that a first space is available in the second storage unit; and program instructions, stored on at least one of the one or more computer-readable tangible storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories, responsive to the availability time elapsing, to clear the first space of stored data, wherein the stored data was entered into the first space by a direct communication over the peer-to-peer network from a second computer of the plurality of computers to the first computer.