Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin => Electrum => Topic started by: rich0292 on October 31, 2017, 10:05:34 AM



Title: I cannot digitally sign BTC to get Byteball with Electrum
Post by: rich0292 on October 31, 2017, 10:05:34 AM
I followed this YT video which explains exactly how to do this using Electrum.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zTuzZNzEd0&list=PLXgkFA3qK9ZWVwV84Ojc5IcxkO98_kemP&index=6&t=279s

But when I paste my btc addresses from my electrum wallet I receive from the byteball bot: 'P2PKH addresses are supported'. Is there a way to get around this in this in the Electrum wallet?

(By the way do not try to use coinbase for this function. You will still find videos explaining how to digitally sign your btc with coinbase but they have disabled this function for a long time now.)


Title: Re: I cannot digitally sign BTC to get Byteball with Electrum
Post by: HCP on October 31, 2017, 10:27:15 AM
Does your address begin with a "1" or a "3"?

If it begins with a "3" (ie. You have an Electrum MultiSig or a 2FA wallet)... Your addresses are "P2SH" - "Pay to Script Hash"...

There is no way to sign a message with a P2SH address :-\ they don't necessarily have a private key... And in the case of MultiSig have multiple private keys associated with them.

You can only sign a message using P2PKH (Pay to pubkey hash) addresses... They start with a "1"... And only have 1 private key associated with them


Title: Re: I cannot digitally sign BTC to get Byteball with Electrum
Post by: LoyceV on October 31, 2017, 10:38:07 AM
Is there a way to get around this in this in the Electrum wallet?
If you move your coins to a "normal" Bitcoin address instead of a SegWit address, you can sign a message and join the airdrop.


Title: Re: I cannot digitally sign BTC to get Byteball with Electrum
Post by: rich0292 on November 01, 2017, 11:52:29 AM
You're correct, my electrum address does begin with a 3. I was wondering if there is a way to move my coins to a normal BTC address within the Electrum wallet. Otherwise how in the world is there a video outlining how signing is indeed possible in that video?

There was in fact one comment in that video with the exact same problem as myself. The answer was that perhaps he had an old version of Electrum. As far as I can tell I have downloaded the correct version.

I, in fact, moved all my BTC to coinbase only to find out that signing is no longer possible there and paid £20 in BTC for the privilege! Ah well, its the way of it in crypto land.

Ill likely end up using Trezer wallet now. I just wondered whether i was too hasty in giving up on Electrum and that there is in fact a method of doing it there.

Thanks for your responses people. Great and active community on here!


Title: Re: I cannot digitally sign BTC to get Byteball with Electrum
Post by: HCP on November 02, 2017, 01:38:17 AM
Yes, you were. Electrum supports having multiple wallets, you can even have them open at the same time. You just can't have different address types in the same wallet.

So, just create a new "standard" wallet in Electrum (no MultiSig, no 2FA). You'll get "normal" P2PKH addresses that all start with a "1".

Send from your old wallet (with the "3" address) to one of the "1" addresses in the new wallet. You'll then be able to use the "sign message" functionality within Electrum (Tools -> sign/verify message) using your new wallet.