Abstract: Methods, apparatus, and programming recorded in machine readable memory are provided for the index, search and retrieval of objects on a global network. This inventive system embeds a distributed index in a routing layer to enable fast search. The method provides dynamic insertion, lookup, retrieval, and deletion of participating nodes, objects and associated metadata in a completely decentralized fashion. Nodes can dynamically join and leave the network. This infrastructure can be applied to content networks for publishing, searching, downloading, and streaming.

Abstract: Software is identified while in main memory by examining small portions of its executable image or by examining the results of its execution. These portions, or an encoding of them, are then compared with previously stored identifying information about at least one Software through an approximate matching process.