Bitcoin Forum

Firstbits.com makes addresses easy to remember and share. More info in this thread (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=16217.0).

I think the most valuable use will be for in-person bitcoin transactions, but it is useful online too, especially where space is limited.

Under your avatar is a good place to put your firstbits.

To get 2 cents:
1. Go to firstbits.com and look up the firstbits of one of your addresses, the address must be in the chain so that it has a firstbits address. You can pick a used address or your can send any amount to yourself at a new address.
2. Put "Firstbits: [your firstbits]" or Firstbits.com/[your firstbits] in the "personal text" section of your profile.
3. Post in this thread to make sure I notice you.
4. Wait until Friday when I start paying. I'll keep watching through the weekend in case you see this thread late.

Participating.

Too bad you didn't pick up a shorter domain name, it would have been a neat address shortener.

1lxap works for me!

It's a neat concept, but how well does it scale?

It is the neatest address shortener. The rule is simple and anyone can implement it. I imagine a desktop widget, a chrome extension, a mobile phone app, and integration in webwallets. Anyone is welcome to make fb.it or whatever they have access to and do conversions there.

FirstBits.com is not assigning your firstbits address, it is figuring it out. A Bitcoin address' firstbits is the starting string that differentiates it from all previous addresses in the chain.

Scale in what way?

Added!

Giving this a try.

Whats the risk of having 2 addresses with the same 1st 5 characters? Or does the Firstbits shortener check for that and assign a different 5 character address if that 5 character combo is already taken?

[Edit]

found the answer on the About page. http://firstbits.com/about.php (http://firstbits.com/about.php)
Should have looked there first


[/edit]

1mdg4

 ;D ;D ;D

I'm always game for some free money. Added.

Done.

I actually *wanted* to put it there, but didn't know about that "Personal text" in the configuration. Great!! Seems that linking with [ url= ] isn't supported tho...

Done.

I won't admit how many of my addresses I've tried... to find one with four characters. I had to settle for one of many five characters. :(

These'll be vanity identifiers in the future. Soon, there will be a market selling short addresses (along with fraudsters keeping the private key).

How did you come across that? Did you run a script? (check out this: http://firstbits.com/1111 )

Like this?

Btw, if anyone wants to use multiple lines, you can try inserting a few " " (that's U+2003) wherever you want a new line (obviously you should test after setting your text to see if it really gets linewrapped)

Other spaces work too, but i think that one is the biggest (please correct me if i'm wrong)

Done.

Now I know I wasted 1 night remembering my regular bitcoin my address :(

By using the vanity patch (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=1387.0) (compilation required) and a couple of hours of CPU time.

Btw, for how long do you want me to keep it like that to receive my money? (i don't plan on changing it soon, i'm asking just in case for some reason later on i feel like doing somthing else with my personal text that would require me to remove the firstbits)

added to my signature

I'll pay some time on Friday and no hard feelings if you take it down after that. I figure most people will prefer it over there anyway, I just wanted to get it started.

Nice!

Thanx :)

Watch out for that first step. It's a duzy!

Donated to the cause. Good work

Firstbits: 187G (Helps if you received coins before 0.3.18 with the 100 default addresses)

Can we tell if all 3 char combos are taken, how may 4 combos left, etc?

Will do it right now.

Done !

Me too!

Added

Firstbits: 1ffrmc

been there since early on :)

done!

Ok.

Firstbits: 1gkkjo

I'm in for 2 cents!!


<------- Done!

Awesome, keep 'em coming.

FYI over 1000 unique visits to FirstBits.com in June and it didn't open until the 13th.

Interesting .  Done.

Kudos on the great idea.

Thanks so much!

Not going to be many 3char (not counting the 1) left, there are 35^4=1.5M 4chars so there should be a lot of those left, but I don't know what the exact fraction is right now. I think the 4 and 5 will become rare before long, but it'll be a really long time before the 6 and 7 get anywhere near filled up.

I've looked through my address book and found a nice address! ;)

Reporting in!

Neat service! :D

Worth a try: 1qfqf

Done.

It's your lucky day. By the time I got to yours I zoned out enough to do the same one twice. That step was a duzy! Please do not return the extra.

.02 BTC received! Thanks!

Quite welcome.

Everyone before this post should be paid. Let me know if I skipped you somehow.

Done. :)

Added the Firsbits address in my sig. Am I still on time for my 2 bitcents? :D

You're in. I'll do another batch on Sunday.

Thank You!

Got it, thanks

Thank you FreeMoney!

Got mine, thanx :)

I always need a few cents - as I only have < 0.003 still.

Another good idea I'm playing with - set underline or bold on the first bits portion of your full adrress when printing or in signatures. This way when someone wants to copy / type it in manually they can immediately see what part is needed to ensure correct match.

eg.

17raXAGM42vZX21Vcb5HDwq2GMLmVwN4qd
17raXAGM42vZX21Vcb5HDwq2GMLmVwN4qd

Which looks better? I kind of like bold.

Remember now - 17raxa, 17raxa, 17raxa, you are feeling sleepy...

How about like this?

I went with bold firstbits for the donate address on the website. A link seems good if the whole thing isn't there, but if the whole is present what's the point of the link? Not that I'll complain if you want to link.

Not everyone will know what to do with the first few bits highlighted, with the link they see what's the point of highlighting the first bits. With time as Firstbits get more well known the link will loose importance, but meanwhile i think it helps.

I figured the bold part was useful when someone wants to "read" it and remember. eg. they go to another form or device and type it in. Makes it easy and they can see the relevant chars. Helps to reinforce remembering the address too.

Also works well for a printed QR code - if there is not cam to scan it then can just type in firstbits. That will take more programs knowing about and accepting Firstbits, doing the lookup and using the full address automatically. I think that will come because the long address is one of the minor deterents for easy use now.

But if they have the option of copy/paste then it doesn't save any effort as they can just mark the whole address.

(Ha. I didn't even realize you had already done that on your site... :) )

I'm in, if I'm not too late.

Thanks!

Judging by the .00000001 transactions I think someone has run a major dictionary attack on their wallet to generate firstbits: http://blockexplorer.com/b/134334

I wouldn't call it an attack. They are probably reserving vanity names so they can sell them later.
All the names I saw have some English words near the start so I'd think that is it.
Soon you'll see a website launch where you can buy names you like - for what price?

I was mostly implying that a combination of a dictionary file and a fair amount of processing time must have been involved in generating those results. I guess it's a business idea of some sort.

I'm using vanity, but

• can't see how that derives in actual transactions.
• many of those addresses aren't mine.

Selling vanity addresses would be useless. I wouldn't trust the seller not to keep a copy of the corresponding key.

Done. 1jwzbr  ;)

got mine. thanks.

added my firstbits also ;)

It could be done. Offering them as a premium option with an eWallet service would be one example, and that wouldn't require more trust than such things already do.

received the 2 bitcents. thanks ;)

Hi,
how are you? I register and add the text as you told.

Well recieved, thank you!

Done.  ;D

Changed, and I like the idea very much.

Received 2 bcents, thanks. I'll leave the firstbits in my signature.

Caught up to this point. No promises from here, but I'll try to check in and keep going for a while.

I would be very interested to hear about anyone using it in the real world. So far I've mostly used it for sending between machines in my house in stead of emailing myself. I did use it in one in-person trade. I had the guy read me some of the address form his wallet and then I showed him what came up and he verified it was the right one. It was a little awkward because I had to ask for a used one though.

I imagine a good use would be integration at point of sale. A little screen displays a QR code and the text address. If you are using a web wallet w/ firstbits integrated you don't have to take a picture you just start typing until the full address shows up and you pay.

I should clarify, you'll either have to see a bunch of wrong addresses popping up as you type (suboptimal imo) or type one char more than the firstbits to indicate that you are done. In the POS scenario I just mentioned the retailer doesn't even know about firstbits except to make sure that they post an address that is in the chain. But they don't need to look up their firstbits or mark it in a special way.

Firstbits on display :D

I think I'm not getting something. When I put in my address, it simply said "This address is not in the chain." The address has been used for btc transfer before, so I don't understand why it's not finding it.

I'm richer than I deserve. thanks. I'll keep the bitcoin address for a while if not forever.

my firstbits address 1nxdw6

Please post or PM me or freemoney so we can take a look at it.  We haven't come up against such a problem before, so I am curious to investigate it further.

Done  :D

Try searching for the address at blockexplorer.com. All I can guess is that you grabbed a different one than you though. The address listed at the top of the Bitcoin client changes on it's own so if you grabbed that one and payed to it you might not have noticed that it changed on you.

I just checked and the generate address from the most recent block is showing it's firstbits, so our database updater is not broken.

I'll still pay if you stick it on the side.

Thanks, BTCs received !!!  ;D

This is exactly what happened. I didn't know the bc client changed the address like this.

Here are my firstbits : 1kznfw

BTC received. Thank you!

I found a new vanity address and somebody sent me a cent on it (thanks).  The transaction went through in 134798, and 25 blocks have been generated since.  Yet, it hasn't shown up in firstbits yet!  What's the deal?

Something strange is going on. I'll investigate.

edit: The only addresses in the chain I've found that firstbits.com can't find are 1samr7 and the change address from that same transaction, other addresses from the same block work, including the generate address. I can't see anything unusual that could have triggered a bug.

Updated my firstbits with a "firstvanity": firstbits.com/1davux (http://firstbits.com/1davux)

In block explorer, both his address, and the change address have their public key listed as "Unknown (not seen yet)", like they haven't sent anything yet. If that's what is causing the bug, simply having samr7 open his Bitcoin client should send those coins to an internal address, and (Hopefully) fix the issue.

You should not need to send from an address for it to get in. This is an error on our side, probably having to do with that missing public key since it's never happened before. But the public key should not be necessary.

Yeah, I know. I'm just saying, the temporary fix is to leave your client open for a while.

I should have realized right away to take the site down. There are at least two addresses 1samr7 and it's change that will "reappear" before current blocks at some point in the future. This means that any new similar address could be told it's wrong firstbits address by firstbits.com until this is fixed.

Got my 2 bitcents on the 4th July. Was on mini-vacation so only saw it today. Thanks!

<-- done

Is someone trying to reserve large portions of the shorter firstbits address space?  Check out this account (http://blockexplorer.com/a/52b74pDU5Y) that seems to be connected with distributing > 100 BTC to weird pseudo-sequential prefixes, and in random quantities less than a micro-bitcoin each.  Yeti pointed out similar behavior, but more focused on vanity addresses here (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=1387.msg326437#msg326437). 

What would this person do: sell the private keys and expect people to use them on an ongoing basis?  If that's true, I sincerely hope no one buys into it.  Otherwise, it seems like scorched earth policy against firstbits, forcing people to use longer prefixes.

It seems odd that they are sending different amounts to each address.  Almost seems like they are trying to encode something into the blockchain with the addresses and amounts.  I've checked some of those addresses out after noticing the same thing, and they weren't particularly good firstbits (many were 1 + 5 characters), so I don't think those are related.

If they form rememberable words they don't need to be short

Payments received :) Thanks

<-- Added mine  ;D

The site is fixed and back up.


Cents sent.

Thanks  ;D. Handy site to shorten addresses!

I already got my 2 bitcents, but I just thought I'd let everyone know that I'm 1 Fancy G now with my new firstbits address. :D

It works now. We've improved our method of writing from the chain to our database so this can't happen anymore. From now on you should be able to get your firstbits once your address has been in the chain for 6 blocks.

1qdiz

Lovely one Q. Diz

I might have to adopt that one.

<-- Added mine   :)

how do we create a custom firstbit address?
great site btw!

Using the Vanity addresses patch or a similar technique

Done. :)

Generate new adresses untill you find a new one. Send coins to it, wait  and check your firstbit address on site ;D

Added. While firstbits.com was done, I found a neat vanity address.  :)

Nice catch ;).

<-- added mine

Edit: received 0.02 btc, thanks

2 bitcents received with thanks.

Done

firstbits.com: 1m2yk

need to work on a vanity one now.

Gotten my firstbits now!

Look, I do it!

Added mine   :)

Just FYI, FreeMoney is in the middle of a move, and doesn't have regular internet access, so it may be several days (possibly longer) before he is able to send any bitcents your way.

OK, thanks for the update  :)

nice idea, very nice.. now i will search for some better address - or just easier to remember for my weak brain ^^

*edit
just some hint for those in need of a nice address, this will help with windows-batch (needs the daemon to be run - the daemon not the server! as the server will respond with gui and not on commandline) to list new addresses in a textfile where you may find some cool addy:


have fun!

It's true, but I got it done anyway. Cents sent.

I'd love to hear about anyone using firstbits in the 'real' world.

I've got it. Thanks!

Awesome idea, can't wait to try it out with someone! ;D

Besides using it to send coins from computer to computer?  :P

Lol, I just mean that online it's easy enough to copy paste a full address. IRL you lose that ability, but firstbits comes to the rescue.

I likes it ....
and the ability to seach from the URL ...
Excellent.

how about making it case sensitive ? [option] or not having to have the 1 at the beginning ?

besides: does the 1 at beginning change at any time?

<--- Added mine

We decided to strip case sensitivity because it is much easier to say your firstbits if you don't have to say "one, capital t, lowercase r, seven, capital f, capital z" but only, "one, t, seven, f, z".

We keep the "1" for the same reason complete addresses have the "1". It lets you know what the string is. Also if people started using firstbits for namecoin or some other chain it could get confusing.

Okay, I added it. :)

Hey Matoking and BCDuke, have you been paid?  I suspect we saw this thread too late, oh well, at least I found out about this great idea. ;D

I first read your post and had no idea what you meant.  Then I noticed about four grammatical errors, but once I finally deciphered you meaning I though it was good advice.  Until I realized that anyone who wants to be anonymous will already be using tor and anyone who doesn't care won't.

 ;)

Have a nice day.

Finally caught up. Glad you guys like it. If you are looking for more freemoney, I spend my days in my poker room now, SealsWithClubs.org.

Hey FreeMoney, you must be keeping score. Have you seen firstbits adopted elsewhere? Is anyone patching the C++ client, online sites using it, posts on the net referencing only their firstbits? I'd like to see firstbits as the default assumed abstraction.

Out of curiosity, do you have any idea the longest minimal firstbit today? Even better, has anyone graphed the shortest/average/longest as a function of blocks (time) with predictions into the future? Perhaps someone can show me how to dump an ordered list of all transaction:addresses and I'll do the graphs myself.

Assuming you don't need anything meaningful, I'd say it's at 1+4 or even 1+3 if you're lucky.



Predicting it would be hard since it depends on the rate of transactions.

I got paid recently, thanks.

I was thinking the other way around. Such as if there were both 123456789a and 123456789b, then the longest firsbits might be 1+9.


Yes, and that would be a fine independent variable, various min, max, averages per transaction. I could calculate it I had a dump of all addresses per block. Can the blk*.dat tell me that? I don't want to DoS blockexplorer with wget/curl requests.

Yep, it's all in blockindex.dat. You might want to look into this patch:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=724.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=724.0)

Hey FreeMoney, how do you prioritize addresses? Suppose 123456789a and 123456789b were first seen in the same block. Which takes nine characters and which takes ten? Alphabetically, ordered tx array, random luck?

The one that comes first in the raw block data is first. Sorry this isn't in the explanation on site.