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LimeWire

TextLimeWire is a peer-to-peer file sharing (P2P) client for the Java Platform, which uses the Gnutella network to locate files as well as share files. Released under the GNU General Public License, LimeWire is free software. It also encourages the user to pay a fee, which will then give the user access to LimeWire PRO. Recently Limewire opened its own store.

As with all file-sharing programs, using LimeWire to download or upload copyrighted files without permission from the authors is generally illegal. Using it to distribute files with permission from the authors, or files that are out of copyright, is generally legal.

Versions

Lime Wire LLC, the New York City based developer of LimeWire, distributes two versions of the program; a basic version for free, and an enhanced version sold for a fee of US$21.95 (1 YEAR $34.95) that offers faster downloads. This is accomplished by facilitating direct connection with up to 10 hosts of an identical searched file at any one time, whereas the free version is limited to a maximum of 8 hosts. Prior to April 2004, the free version of LimeWire was distributed with a bundled program called LimeShop (a variant of TopMoxie), which was considered by computer security experts to be spyware. Among other things, LimeShop monitored online purchases in order to redirect sales commissions to Lime Wire LLC. Uninstallation of LimeWire would not remove LimeShop. With the removal of all bundled software in LimeWire 3.9.4 (released on April 20, 2004), these objections were addressed.

Being free software, LimeWire has spawned several forks, including LionShare, an experimental software development project at Penn State University, and Acquisition, a Mac OS X–based Gnutella client with a proprietary interface. Researchers at Cornell University developed a reputation management add-in called Credence that allows users to distinguish between "genuine" and "suspect" files before downloading them. An October 12, 2005 report states that some of LimeWire's free and open source software contributors have forked the project and called it FrostWire. The makers of the LimeWire software have now installed a security device that can track most viruses in files.

LimeWire was the first file sharing program to support firewall-to-firewall file transfers, a feature introduced in version 4.2, which was released in November 2004. LimeWire also now includes BitTorrent support, but is limited to 3 Torrent-uploads and 3 Torrent-downloads, which coexist with ordinary downloads.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article LimeWire.