US Patent 8719345 Database replication using collaborative data transfers

Techniques are described herein for propagating continuously generated data from a seed to a plurality of peers without requiring the seed to send the new data to all peers, and without establishing static sender/receiver relationships between the peers. The data generated by the seed is divided into a number of “windows”, where each window is divided into a number of “pieces”. The seed sends the data piece-by-piece to different peers. The peer to which the seed sends any given piece may be selected at random. The peers exchange pieces until all pieces of a window are obtained by each peer. When a peer receives all pieces of a window, the pieces are applied at the peer, and the process repeats for the next window.