Vuze, the BitTorrent client formerly known as Azureus, has a new update available (versions 4.3.1.2+). Although the update isn't too earth shattering, Azureus has a few new features worthy of mention.

First up is a remote download feature. We're a bit surprised that Azureus didn't always have this feature, however such an implementation was always available via third party plug-ins. But now it's natively supported, which should make the whole process easier for those put off by the whole third party plug-in process. The web user interface is based on Transmission's implementation, which Team Azureus gave full props to. From Azureus:

"Have you ever been out, and realized that you forgot to queue a Vuze download to watch when you get home? With the new Vuze Remote, you can now securely control your Vuze client from any computer or smartphone with a web browser. Pretty cool, eh? Not to mention, very useful for those meetings or classes where your mind has already fast forwarded to Friday night entertainment..."

Team Azureus is also touting faster downloads thanks to the arrival of a several upgrades:

∙ Faster initiation of new torrents through “Allowed Fast” support (enabling new peers to quickly start downloading despite their lack of pieces to trade)

∙ Connecting to more seeds and peers on launch of a new torrent (for Vista SP2+ and Windows 7), and through optimized support of LibTorrent peer exchange

∙ Quickly switching to better performing peers through faster connection timeouts

∙ Faster ramp-up of better performing peers.

All these additions do seem like they'll make things a bit quicker, although on the first one, we're not sure how downloads will be quicker if there's no data to share. Interesting...

In any event, we're always happy to see an open source project like Vuze roll out new versions and promote the well-being of the file-sharing community.

Date: 2010-02-02 Source: http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1905