Creating a Torrent

Create a new Torrent

You can make a new torrent easily using BitTorrent's built-in torrent maker:

BitTorrent menu > File > Create New torrent

This opens the "Create New Torrent" dialog box; all you need is to fill in the required information...

1. The Source

Here is where you specify the location of the
content you wish to share. Before selecting the path chose whether you
are sharing a single file or multiple ones. If you are making a torrent
with more then one file those files must be located in a single folder,
with nothing else in it.

1. Select "Add a File" or "Add a directory."
2. Browse your way to the location of file or directory you would like to share.

2. The Tracker

A tracker is an application or script on a
system that relays connection information about peers on a given
torrent. However, it is most important since without it BitTorrent
clients would not know how to find other clients sharing the same files.
BitTorrent knows which tracker to contact by reading the announce URL
in the torrent. Trackers generally look like any other internet address
(http//somewebaddress:portnumber/announce). If you need a tracker you
may:

• Check the site where you wish to upload the torrent.
• Private sites usually provide their own tracker.
• Public sites may also provide their own tracker, or include the URL of generic ones.
• In a pinch, look at the properties of a torrent you have
  downloaded from the site you wish to use and copy the tracker from there
  (but in such a case wait to test the torrent out before uploading it to
  the site as even those tracker may require you to have registered the
  torrent with them first).

BitTorrent supports HTTP and HTTPS (SSL) trackers. UDP trackers
are not supported. BitTorrent also supports torrents with multiple
trackers; trackers from the same server (with similar URLs) must be
grouped together and those from different servers separated by a blank
line.

BitTorrent contains an "embedded tracker"
intended for people wishing to share with a small group for a short
period of time. This should not be used for sharing torrent over public
or private sites, but only for private stuff and over short periods of
time (along the lines of family movies shared with friends and such).

• The embedded tracker URL is: http://your_ip_address:port/announce
  (where your ip is your computer's ip address and port is BitTorrent's
  listening port)
• The embedded tracker must be enabled in: BitTorrent menu >
  options > preferences > Advanced > bt.enable_tracker: set to
  "true".

Warning: Using the embedded tracker requires
you to have the same IP address and the same port as long as the
torrent is active. This means if you use a dynamic IP and randomized
port and get disconnected from the internet, your IP and port will get
reset, and the torrent will die.

3. Comments

You may add a comment about the torrent (in BitTorrent these comments appear at the bottom of the general tab.)

4. Piece Size

When making a torrent, the content gets divided in small pieces
for easier transfer and management. You may use this option to select
the size of the pieces. As a rule, the larger the content the larger the
pieces. Most people should leave this setting to auto-detect and allow BitTorrent to make the proper selection.

5. Others

• "Start Seeding" will automatically load the newly made
  torrent into BitTorrent when you have completed the process. Some may
  wish to disable it if the site they are uploading to requires them to
  "re-download" the torrent for seeding (this occurs with some sites
  requiring passwords or cookies). If unchecked, you will need to load the
  torrent into BitTorrent manually for seeding.
• "Private Torrent" will disable DHT (Distributed Hash
  Table) and PEX (Peer EXchange), which are alternate means of getting
  peers from other peers instead of the tracker. This is particularly
  useful when the tracker is unavailable for some reason. However some
  private sites do not allow it because it keeps them from monitoring
  users' share ratio properly and allows members to share torrents with
  unregistered users.

6. Create and Save As...

This is the final step in making a torrent.
For all intents and purposes it works just like saving a file in any
other application.

You should save the torrent in an appropriate location, such as
where your other torrents are located or in the folder of the torrent
you are making (this will not affect the content).

Naming conventions:
You can name your torrent anything
you want, but remember that other people need to search for it and find
it. The name should be significant, and representative of the content.
Calling it "My first torrent" will not tell anything about the content,
and few people will take a chance and download it. You may have seen
this naming convention around before:

"My Vacation movies_1996_CAM_MPG_BYME.torrent" which would translate as:
"title_episode_quality_format_maker.torrent".

• "Title" should be simple and descriptive if needed.
• "Episodes" is a number used when dealing with sequential
  torrents. It can be a date, a release, or a label with season and
  episode (common formats include 102, 1x02, and s01e02, which all
  translate to season 1, episode 2).
• "Quality" denotes the source or the type of file.
• "Format" gives peers an indicator of what will be needed to use the content (xvid, doc, avi, mp3, iso, etc).
• "Maker" shows the credits for the torrent and/or the content.

Remember, many operating systems limit file names to 256 characters so it's better to plan ahead.

Making your Torrent Available to Others

The most common way to do this is to upload it to a torrent site.
If this was your intention you should have read up on the site's
policies, rules and procedures of that site before uploading.

Uploading the .torrent

1. Using your web browser, go to the site (log in if needed).
2. Navigate your way to the upload page, and follow the instructions provided.
3. Some sites allow you to add comments and descriptions. Try to put something you would find useful as a peer.