Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin is growing at an exponential rate; however, the gateway to this glorious innovation lies in the hands of a few exchanges. No longer! As I speak, I am taking the steps towards the contruction of open-source exchange software. The precipice in Bitcoin exchanges! I want to enable the common man, with a mere whim to open his own exchange whether it be trading Bitcoins for securities, other currencies or in a completely anonymous environment. Decentralization will now come to a higher level.

Now, this won't be just some mere cluster of open PHP code. Oh, of course not! This will be the finest exchange software this world has to offer!

Which brings me to my objective: I need to know what my fellow traders want to see in an exchange. I want to see what is left to be desired! I want your needs to be bet to the pinnacle of satisfaction. I want the most seamless experience possible!

So, give me a valid quality, original opinion on your desires of said exchange software and I will pay you .01 BTC. So, make sure to end your post with a lovely address.

Godspeed and much obliged.

How about a view from the common man that doesn't know anything about trading?

I want to gamble it up. I want an option that has someone put up a large chunk of their money, with a small chunk of my money, and if the rate drops a little bit I lose my share but if it goes up I have bigger potential for gain. No idea what it's called, but I want it.

Does that count for .25c? 1C9wmmXbKy8speH3y3UCg4RzqA2ZjShLPb  ? :D

Charts... I want all of them, and I want them configurable.

Take a look at the logarithm charts of price over difficulty and difficulty over price specifically.

Also, please incorporate a live ticker that users aren't forced to refresh the page hundreds of times a day.

See here for an example:

http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=7427.0 (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=7427.0)

Leverage.

I would like to be able to trade in multiple currencies. Bitcoins, Namecoins, Dollars, and possibly others.

i want one-click exchange between Bitcoin and any currency on earth - in both directions.

i want to be able to exchange BTC for any currency, and have that currency deposited into any bank - no matter what the status of that account might be to the regulators in my country (the US).  i don't mind using tor, or a VPN.

i want no records kept after transactions are successfully completed, to the satisfaction of both parties.  so it would need to be established in a place where that is possible.

i don't care about short-selling, long-buying, credit default fanciness, or anything other than a pure exchange.

but YMMV.

Also, the ability to create reciepts or records of transactions for tax reporting purposes would be nice.

"buy it now" or "sell it now" as opposed to some type of order matching - like when ebay produced the 'buy it now' feature. So a list that people can view and respond to.

Some people just want to buy or sell a bundle of bitcoins, not have to place orders.

BULLETPROOF anonymity.

 As Mr. Frontero said, for now the best option is likely TOR, but TOR is slow, and the amount of traffic a busy exchange would generate could probably make statistical forensic analysis of exit nodes that much easier for the wonks in the Black Box in Greenville.

So, with that in mind, I'd like all of the things previously mentioned, AND a solution to the Exit Node problem. Have it on my Desk by COB Friday, thx.

Trading from wallet directly to bank account. I send my coins to the buyers wallet he sends cash to my checking/savings account.

 No intermediary means no central account to ban. I don't know if this is possible but that's what I would like to see. It increases liquidity and protects bitcoin.

If you think that is worth anything
1PCZwHeBehy1gvJccZnsoDEFRh2T4jcRA

The ability to sell short, or to create and then buy/sell options (Calls & Puts) would legitimize Bitcoins in the 'real world.'  Of course, who monitors naked short selling and other issues?  I leave that to those smarter than I.  Also as this is meant to be configurable software, it would be nice to allow the owner/operator of the exchange to use any and all currencies as a basis of exchange, including Linden$, WoW Gold or whatever else one might come up with.  Decentralizing the exchange is likely to be the biggest hurdle toward Bitcoins gaining acceptance in the wider economic community.  No clue how useful my thoughts are, but if so my address is in my sig.  Good luck!

I want support for mobile devices, maybe an app for Iphone/Ipad/Touch. With SSL.

Also, I want have option to exchange to precious metals, the yellow one, and the er..silvery one.


1621CyDporXDEbeVim1KkT8dYqCPhRmSYB

I want the domain and hosting to be somewhere that wouldn't care.

Antarctica?
 :D

What many people are describing is a feature list for the front-end to the exchange, more like what a brokerage would provide.

I would love to see exchange server software that exposes an API only. The server would provide live data over Secure WebSockets with a nice fall back (AJAX, JSONP). Any exchange operation could be performed over the API - Buy, Sell, Short, Cover, account, order book, trades. You could require users to authenticate over OAuth or something like it so that API calls can be traced to an account.

Be sure to publish thorough API Documentation - as in this: http://dev.twitter.com/doc

That way, whoever is implementing the exchange has the core software written for them, and they simply create the interface software on the front end. They could limit the interface with the server API to a web-based front end or expose it to the public for app creation, etc.

Not sure how you world implement this, but something keeping me away from the main exchanges is the possibility of government / nefarious third parties raiding the servers and eventually tracking your purchases.  I want the anonymity that bitcoin is known for.

Thank you all so far. Very insightful.

Let me state that payments will be sent out at an exchange rate of $30/BTC. This will happen within the day.

If possible, a modular design with extensions for optional features. Keep the core simple, so different exchanges/installations stay as compatible as possible.

SSH, Tor, or even Freenet compatibility? I see someone else requested bulletproof anonymity, count me as +1 for that.

Ability to manually set for how long logs are kept, with a different setting for each type of log (fiat/BTC trade, incoming/outgoing transactions from banks/users, user logons, etc). Default to something low, default to automatically publish what these settings are.

All custom settings stored in the same folder for easy backup.

.deb/.rpm/.exe installers for us newbs.

+1 to the server API idea too, it's more secure and easy automated trading is a must.

Ability to cap outgoing packets and bandwidth, to stay under the radar.

If any of this didn't make your eyes bleed, I'm 1BkVFVnCSgQPseMtQ4Yr4h426T6z6ug3Dw

I'm a portfolio manager for an investment fund, so I'm very familiar with the requests mentioned. But let me warn you: a casino-type atmosphere (and that's what it is) of get-rich-quick "market makers" that add pseudo-liquidity as I'm seeing here is borne of nothing but greed. And it doesn't last.

You want bitcoin to thrive and be decentralized? Assume the average bitcoin user is of below-average intelligent. Make it easy for the masses. Forget the geek speak. Forget the pipe dreams of some wanna-be forex speculators that have little real world experience.

Think of a bitcoin exchange in terms of the people you see at the grocery stores, the bank, the gas station, anywhere really. People that know NOTHING about finance or technology. Could your mother or grandmother use any bitcoin exchange?

Many people are just now hearing of bitcoin, yet when they go to investigate it, all they see is confusing, unwieldy gibberish.

A lot of you guys have dollar signs in your eyes, but you overestimate your own knowledge. You'll actually get richer in the long run if bitcoin offers sustainable and easy exchanges for the masses, not just a means of speculation. You want brokerage services? Fine, but the only reason brokerage services work for other currencies is because those other currencies have far greater liquidity and velocity than bitcoin. Don't get ahead of yourselves. One thing at a time.

Shorting Shorting Shorting Shorting Shorting Shorting

We are depriving ourselves of liquidity and stability with no available shorting methods.

A method for everyone to be able to despoit money AND withdraw it at anytime with minimum fuss.
Americans, Europeans, Aussies, Chinese, Africans, Etc.

bank deposits perhaps.

I would love to be able to code Robots and Indicators like in MetaTrader. Set stops and limits within the chart. Be able to setup alerts.

And of course trade on Margin.

1. Live charts - take a look at any of the forex dealers, they have price widgets on a top bar and chart displays nested below.
2. Price Widgets - Bid/Offer and size of the closest bid and offer underneath. Be nice if the bid or offer flashed a color when updated.
3. Rudimentary Technical Tools - Moving averages, trend lines, RSI, Stochastic, Bollinger Bands
4. Payout options - send to several different Bitcoin wallet addresses at the same time if needed
5. Trading Statements - Buy/Sell, Quantity, Price, Timestamp, Cost Basis, Profit/Loss, Full or Partial Fills indicated
6. Order Types - Limits, Stops, Market Orders
7. Sliding fee scale based on volume of the trade - encourage liquidity for larger chunks
8. Darkpool listing of orders over a certain limit - choice to show/hide bid/offer on book

That is all I can think of at the moment.

Best of luck on the venture!

Be careful what you listen to here. I understand you are using this as a brainstorming thread, but the thing that incorporated all these suggestions would be a monster indeed. A simple, easy to follow interface, with more complex features available but not front and center is a time-tested design practice.

All exchanges have certain basic features and so it might be helpful to point out where other exchanges are NOT doing so well. Mt Gox does a good job on the simplicity front, unlike bitcoinmarket.com which seems to think currency pairs are a virtue. Bitcoin2cash requires a user to keep an order that he wants to buy in memory while he changes to the buy screen. Forcing users to keep things in memory is a bad thing. But it's nice how they have buy and sell orders side by side, unlike bitmarket.eu, which requires one to scroll up and down to see both.

I don't know, I could go on and would be willing to, but I'll wait and see what comes of this thread. Thanks for asking!

+1

I would especially like it to allow for the possibility of trading between Bitcoin and derivatives like Namecoin. It needs to easily interface with various banking protocols so operators don't have to manually add wired funds to specific accounts. It should also allow for deposits from the likes of Dwolla, WingCash, and any other payment systems that might pop-up. In other words, it needs to be as future proof as possible. I guess it goes without saying that trades should go through the exchange. I don't think it's enough for the exchange to play matchmaker.

Oh, and GPG verification/authentication, at least as an option. Despite the complexity, some users might prefer managing their own security.

That's all for now. See my signature for an address.

I would like a p2p system for announcing and matching quotes...I want the exchange to be between bitcoin and ripplepay like debt in various currencies rather than the actual currencies.  It's possible you would need a separate block chain to track the ripple debt transactions and somehow make the exchange between ripple debt and bitcoin be atomic and irreversible.  Settlement of ripple-debt can take place between individuals and their adjacent nodes in the ripple trust network.  Super-nodes in the ripple network that swap a cash deposit for credit can develop to help facilitate connections through the trust network.

.01 BTC sent out to all contributors thus far. Again, much obliged.

If this is to be the premier exchange, then having merchant software integrated would be a good idea. What I mean by merchant software is the ability for consumers to pay directly and instantly out of their wallets into the merchant's at a real-time local currency exchange rate. Based on my conversations with brick and mortar merchants, if they could easily (without waiting for transfers between BTC wallets) swap between BTC and local currency, they would be much more likely to adopt BTC.

Well, allow me to clear up that I am not just creating software for one exchange. No, what I am doing is creating open software that anybody could use. So, a merchant module will definitely be doable. I will certainly make this possible.

Bitcoin central does most of that, care to improve it instead of starting all from scratch ?

You can consider me competition.

To add to the other excellent suggestions here from others.

Ease of use, one click limit-orders by left-clicking on orderbook. As an option for the trader, also allow to disable confirmation.

Built in prediction market, covered option, and some vanilla swaps market, and margin trading.

Some basic semi-automated trading structure, ie: limit order if price < x, stoploss if price < y, accumulate if price < z.. etc

That's just on top of my head.

I think exchanges of the type of bitmarket.eu and OTC have more chances of succeeding in the long run, and can be more numerous. That's because the exchange owner doesn't need to keep any link to the standard banking system. It's more "decentralized" if you will. In many countries, that's mandatory for the exchange survival.

So, if I were you, I'd go for this type of exchange, with the flexibility to use any currency and multiple payment methods, as well as escrow.

The idea of two or more open source projects, using compatible licenses, competing against each other seems counter intuitive. However such projects might try to separate themselves, how can they not cooperate?

Have you see the Open Transactions (https://github.com/FellowTraveler/Open-Transactions/wiki) platform.  It may be a good place to start building the backend.

Make it fast, simple (both in terms of software architecture and interface), and scalable.

Calculate with exponential growth and bursty page loads. I hate it when BTC exchange sites load so slowly.

Make sure you can also process funds from Europe. Not only EUR but also CHF and the scandinavian currencies, where the big money lies ;)

Oh, and PayPal would be great but I don't think it's feasible anymore  ::)

I want the ability to add funds instantly if I have enough collateral in the account already. eTrade has this and it's great. For example, I have 100 dollars in my account. I want to add 50 dollars. You can allow that to happen instantly, because I already have the funds to back it up if the transfer doesn't go through for some reason.

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Moneybookers.

Short selling if you can cover.

Futures & options.

Stop loss orders.

Fill or kill orders.

Ability to trade at the .001 or even lower in case the exchange rate continues to grow.

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Create an exchange "mailing list" that people can subscribe to where making a bid or an ask is as simple as sending and receiving email. Then people can have an exchange client that sits on their own computer rather than on a server.

Messages are routed between clients not through a central mail server, a p2p mailing list.

Many good points thedude42.

Level 2  ask/bid prices

Proper secure payment methods. Credit and debit card payment.

Hah, I'm not really competing :)
Just wondering if you considered taking BCs source to build your very own exchange.

That's a neat way to resurrect an old thread. At least you didn't use this image:


http://www.onemanandhisblog.com/images/gentlemen.jpg