Bitcoin Forum

We keep losing nodes..... :S.

When I checked in periodically during the week we were in the 500s and 600s
900 is actually not too bad

Oh, okay , thanks.

+6000, well that's more like it!!

and with future improvements it will be easier to sync and run a full node  :)

Please excuse my ignorance, but what is meant by running a "full node"?  How is this different than running the bitcoin-qt client?  I'm not trying to be a smart a$$ or anything, I just don't know and want to understand it better.

A full node is in fact the Bitcoin-Qt client. It relays and verifies blocks and is also capable of serving work if you are a miner.

Oh, ok.  I thought I remember someone on here saying before that you weren't actually running a full node on your bitcoin-qt client unless you opened up additional ports on your firewall. Is that true?  I'm not sure why opening up more ports would make you a full node unless it's because you can process more traffic or something.

Yes, You need port 8333 open ... you can test here:

http://www.yougetsignal.com/tools/open-ports/

So once that port is opened (port forwarded), what does it actually do for the bitcoin-qt client that's different from before?

Tcp port 8333 enables communication between the bitcoin clients.

Necessary to act as a full node, otherwise you will be limited to 8 incoming connections with no outgoing connections.

First post full of panic :P Reality isn't as bad as you think ;)

7000 nodes is a big or a small amount? A few month ago was more or less full nodes? :P

Slow and steady decline -
http://www.coinbuzz.com/2014/04/28/bitnodes-io-indicates-60-day-decline-bitcoin-nodes/

Avg 9500 early this year and 7800 avg 6 months ago.

Ah, ok.  I just opened up port 8333 and noticed that my number of active connections went from 8 to 10.  I'm seeing the below entries in my debug log.  Is this normal?  (I removed my IP address in the log below)

2014-11-10 17:52:33 ProcessBlock: ACCEPTED
2014-11-10 17:52:33 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : inputs already spent
2014-11-10 17:52:33 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : inputs already spent
2014-11-10 17:52:57 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : inputs already spent
2014-11-10 17:52:58 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : inputs already spent
2014-11-10 17:53:00 receive version message: /bitcoinseeder:0.01/: version 60000, blocks=230000, us=x.x.x.x:8333, them=0.0.0.0:0, peer=178.62.20.190:43641
2014-11-10 17:53:00 Added time data, samples 17, offset +0 (+0 minutes)
2014-11-10 17:53:00 nTimeOffset = -1  (+0 minutes)
2014-11-10 17:53:03 receive version message: /bitcoinseeder:0.01/: version 60000, blocks=230000, us=x.x.x.x:8333, them=0.0.0.0:0, peer=199.127.225.232:45435
2014-11-10 17:53:03 Added time data, samples 18, offset +0 (+0 minutes)
2014-11-10 17:53:05 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : nonstandard transaction: dust
2014-11-10 17:53:05 socket recv error Connection reset by peer (54)
2014-11-10 17:53:08 ERROR: AcceptToMemoryPool : nonstandard transaction: dust

Congrats, you are now allowing outbound traffic and not merely a leach upon other nodes.

I'm up to 15 connections now.  Am I right to assume that you are not actually verifying transactions on the Bitcoin network unless you are also allowing outbound traffic?

Yes.

what is loosing nodes,bitcoin?

Maybe BTC protocol should introduce something similar to PoS to encourage people to have full node opened? :P

Go ahead, let us know when the client fork is ready, fork the blockchain and we'll see who is ready to switch to PoS.

Update thread title, please.

Probably not a good idea. PoS coins are too easy to attack