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Ideally, only positive impact. If done correctly, peer-to-peer content distribution is invisible to the end user — and only as visible to the administrators as they want it to be. (Also read: What is peer-to-peer content distribution?)
The main concern is to prevent interruption of business processes, whether that be bandwidth-related or endpoint-related. On the bandwidth side, the peer-to-peer content distribution platform must be network aware in order to prevent bandwidth saturation.
Enterprise traffic cannot be disrupted, so the peer-to-peer platform needs to be able to adjust to existing (and future) conditions. Top peer-to-peer systems can monitor bandwidth and adjust accordingly based on business traffic. (Also read: How is peer-to-peer content distribution used at an enterprise?)
A secondary — but still important — concern is cost. While LAN-based bandwidth is “free,” bandwidth over the internet or from the CDN to the WAN is typically metered.
When you’re talking about highly distributed, global networks, the cost to distribute large content, such as OS updates, can be significant. With a large number of homogeneous endpoints, it would be ideal to download an update across the metered link only once and then have it distributed across the network.
Top peer-to-peer systems have this capability.
One of the ways that peer-to-peer solutions can make this delicate dance work is through intelligent content storage. In order to reduce the number of downloads over metered links, the software needs to be stored on the local area network.
You could store it on distribution points, but that’s just another system for admins to manage. In reality, most endpoints have much more storage space and compute power than they need, so content can conceivably be stored on these systems without business disruption.
The end result is that other systems on the network always have access to the content they need, and they can get updates without interrupting business processes.
