ZeroCT White Paper Published



Welcome to the first NavCoin Community News of 2019. We hope you had a great holiday season and are keeping to your New Year’s resolutions. The Core team and wider community have certainly hit the ground running this year, with a wide range of interesting projects underway already.

Head on over to NavHub to read the latest Community News:

https://navhub.org/news/2019-01-23-zeroct-white-paper-published

Total inflation is approximately 2.5M NAV per year which approximately 4% per annum with 63M total supply. Since inflation is fixed at 2.5M per annum, over time as a percentage it decreases. Eg, if there were 100M total supply, 2.5M NAV would only equal 2.5% per annum.

Yeah, we are really happy with the range of skilled industry experts who were willing to review this white paper. Alex wrote the first iteration of the paper and we shared an advanced copy with the mentioned list of cryptographers requesting peer review of the methods viability before we publicly published the paper. Each reviewers specific level of engagement was dependent on how much time they were able to spare around their existing projects, but everyone listed read the paper and provided us with constructive feedback which we integrated into the published version.

As stated in the acknowledgement section, their review should not be considered an endorsement or indicate liability, and they were providing feedback voluntarily (non commercially) in a cooperative manner.

We are humbled that so many of our esteemed industry peers were willing to spare their time and energy to review this white paper.

Alex V Publishes Zero Confidential Transactions White Paper for Peer Review



NavCoin engineer/researcher Alex V has been working on a new iteration of the zero coin protocol "Zero Confidential Transactions" that's been published for peer review. We've had the paper reviewed in advance by various cryptographers who are familiar with cryptocurrency and are now seeking public peer review by anyone who is interested in what we've designed.

The NavCoin Core team are working on a testnet implementation as well as explainer articles / videos and an AMA to take place soon.

All feedback and comments welcome.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330366788_Zero_Confidential_Transactions

Alex V Publishes Zero Confidential Transactions White Paper for Peer Review



NavCoin engineer/researcher Alex V has been working on a new iteration of the zero coin protocol "Zero Confidential Transactions" that's been published for peer review. We've had the paper reviewed in advance by various cryptographers who are familiar with cryptocurrency and are now seeking public peer review by anyone who is interested in what we've designed.

The NavCoin Core team are working on a testnet implementation as well as explainer articles / videos and an AMA to take place soon.

All feedback and comments welcome.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330366788_Zero_Confidential_Transactions

NavTech has been decommissioned as it was proving to be difficult to maintain. We've just published the white paper for what will take its place, my next post will be the announcement.

Static Rewards and Cold Staking are now active on the network.

Congratulations to everyone who helped make these two important security upgrades to the NavCoin protocol possible.



https://www.navexplorer.com/soft-forks

The NavCoin 4.5.1 HardFork has been a success. Blocks are progressing with the correct version bit signalling past the fork height. If you're still on 4.5.0 or below, make sure you upgrade as soon as possible and join the community on discord if you're having any issues.

Approximately T Minus 1 hour 45 minutes until the 4.5.1 HardFork.

Make sure you're updated to NavCoin Core 4.5.1 before block 2722100 to avoid network disruption.

https://navcoin.org/en/wallets/#download-core

NavCoin Core 4.5.1 Hard Fork



NavCoin is hard forking at block 2722100 to mitigate an issue with the Community Fund expired proposal states. It is mandatory to update to NavCoin Core 4.5.1 before Friday 21 December at 00:00AM GMT to avoid network disruption.

Currently if a node reindexes their chainstate db, the node will recalculate the deadline of expired proposals and rewrite such proposals as accepted. A node which reindexes will end up with a different state and potentially reject blocks containing payment requests causing some users to end up on their own fork of the blockchain.

This bug was discovered by NavCoin Community member Prodpeak who operates navexplorer.com. Helping the NavCoin Core developers identify and rectify potential issues before they impact the network is a vital role of the NavCoin Community and we are grateful for Prodpeaks assistance and encourage everyone to get involved in our beta and release candidate testing programmes.

The issue has been successfully patched and the unit tests have been updated to confirm the issue is resolved.

4.5.1 contains a hard fork which explicitly rejects blocks from obsolete versions (4.5.0 and below) signalled by version bit 20. Upgrading to 4.5.1 will avoid a potential network fork and ensure you remain on the same blockchain as the rest of the network.

It’s worth noting that upgrading to 4.5.1 does not enforce the Cold Staking and Static Reward consensus changes currently being voted on by the network. The soft fork votes for these changes will continue as normal.

Update to 4.5.1 before Friday 21 December

The hard fork is scheduled to occur at block 2722100 which is approximately Friday 21 December at 00:00AM GMT. All users and exchanges must upgrade to 4.5.1 before Friday 21 December 00:00AM GMT or they will risk forking from the network. All stakers must also upgrade or their blocks will be rejected by the rest of the network.

As an extra precaution we have recommended that exchanges disable deposits and withdrawals of NAV from Friday 21 December 00:00AM GMT until after the hard fork has occurred and we have confirmed that the expired proposal did not cause any network disruption.

To read the full changelog please read the NavCoin Core GitHub release notes.

https://github.com/NAVCoin/navcoin-core/blob/master/doc/release-notes/release-notes-4.5.1.md

You can download version 4.5.1 from the downloads section of navcoin.org or directly from the NavCoin Core GitHub release.

https://navcoin.org/en/wallets/#download-core

https://github.com/NAVCoin/navcoin-core/releases/tag/4.5.1

source: https://navcoin.org/en/notices/2018-12-17-navcoin-4-5-1-hard-fork/

This has been split out into a sister project called Valence Platform https://valenceplatform.org/

PSA: Community Fund Locked-in, Upgrade Now Mandatory.



Make sure you update to NavCoin Core 4.4.0 before block 2,620,800 to avoid being forked from the main NAV blockchain.

https://navcoin.org/en/notices/2018-11-09-community-fund-locked-in-upgrade-now-mandatory

#HumansOfNavCoin Activation Competition



The NavCoin Community Fund softfork voting is well underway and looking likely to lock-in at the end of the next voting period (approximately 00:00 GMT Friday 9 November 2018). To help showcase potential Community Fund proposals we’ve been running a #HumansOfNavCoin hashtag campaign on twitter.

You’ll find all sorts of great ideas like this one proposed by twitter user @CryptoSmartHub to launch a grass roots campaign to get NavCoin used in local markets.



https://twitter.com/NavCoin/status/1056817988672913408

We’re really excited about all the great ideas which are being proposed, it looks like there are going to be some amazing things created by the community when the Community Fund activates. To support the community’s efforts, NavCoin Core are going to offer their help and support to one of the most popular proposal ideas.

All you have to do is tweet your proposal idea with the hashtag #HumansOfNavCoin. The more likes and retweets your tweet gets, the more entries you get into the competition. We will pick one of the most liked and retweeted proposal ideas, and help the creator to bring the project to life.

NavCoin Core will help the winner publish their idea, submit the funding proposal, promote it to the NavCoin Community and even help to execute the idea, or help find the right team which can.

The winner will of course also earn the NAV which is allocated by the Community Fund for their proposal if the network consensus is achieved.

The competition will run up until the Community Fund activates on the network, one week after lock-in is achieved, approximately 00:00 GMT Friday 16 November 2018 depending on how the network continues to vote.

TL;DR

• Tweet your Community Fund proposal idea with the #HumansOfNavCoin hashtag.
• Get your followers to like and retweet your tweet.
• The winner will be chosen from the most popular tweets.
• Likes earn 1 point, retweets earn 2 points.
• The winner will be drawn when the Community Fund activates on the network.
• The winner will receive help and support from NavCoin Core to achieve their proposal.
• The winner will keep the NAV claimed from the community fund proposal.
• Easy right? Better get your thinking cap on and start tweeting!

If you’re new to NavCoin and don’t know what the Community Fund is, you can read all about it on the NavCoin Community Fund page.

To keep an eye on when the competition closes, you can track the softfork voting status on the NavExplorer site.

I've started a seperate thread about our blockchain education sessions. Feel free to jump over there and suggest topics, or join the discussion:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5031435.new#new

Hi Everyone,

For those who don't know me, I'm Craig, one of the co-founders of NavCoin and also one of it's core protocol developers.

We've started broadcasting education live streams around tech that we're proposing to NavCoin's protocol. The first session was on Cold Staking and includes some good information on how UTXO transactions work in general. You can view it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjez0_Gd0sU

The first session had a few technical difficulties which should be ironed out now. Including a better internet connection and microphone.

The topics we're going to cover include things which are relevant to other proof of stake coins, blockchain in general. So even if you're not necessarily into NavCoin, it's still worth tuning in if you want to learn more about the technical side of blockchain and cryptocurrencies.

Our second education live stream is happening this Thursday 20 September at 8:30am GMT+12. We'll be discussing the benefits of static block rewards in Proof of Stake security.



There will be live Q&A so put it in your calendar.

Tune in on the NavCoin Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjDs4JceVSsaeCyvkA9cWCg/live

I'll keep this thread up to date with the live stream info as we plan new ones. Feel free to suggest topics which you want to know more about!

Some upcoming topics include; Decentralised Governance, Private Transactions, Cryptocurrency Security Practices and more.

NavCoin Core 4.3.0 Release Candidate



This week brings your chance to test and comment on the release candidate for NavCoin Core 4.3.0. This update introduces the OpenAlias feature for NavCoin core, adds wallet support for bootstrapping, and delivers some GUI fixes.

Read More

Developer & Content Manifestos, Retesting NavCoin 4.2.0



Following on from the NavCoin Brand Guidelines published a couple of weeks ago, the NavCoin Core content contributors have added even more resourceful content that will further help empower community members to become active contributors in their own right. Expanding on that theme, there has been plenty of activity by community members this past week - from more merchants in Italy to a tipping bot on Telegram. Developers have been hard at it too, focussing on the retesting of the NavCoin Core 4.2.0 release candidate, and creation of NavCoin Protocol Improvement Proposals (NPIP’s).

https://medium.com/@NAVCoin/developer-content-manifestos-retesting-navcoin-4-2-0-ed3415c6fe1d

Community Fund Phase One Preview and NavCoin.org Refresh



This week brings the opportunity for the whole community to get involved in and informed about the upcoming soft fork in NavCoin 4.2.0  -  which will kick off the Community Fund accumulation. And as usual there are exciting community initiatives to inspire you, and news of incoming work by the Core Content contributors.

https://medium.com/@NAVCoin/community-fund-phase-one-preview-and-navcoin-org-refresh-19d98f89edb6

NavCoin 4.2.0 Release Candidate now available for review



Because NavCoin is an open source community project with various contributors its important to provide everyone with the opportunity to perform due diligence prior to releasing any consensus changes.

The NavCoin Core developers have enacted a policy to create a release candidate and publicly notify all interested parties of any important updates prior to merging the changes into the master branch. This release schedule will be formalised into a process document to be published on the NavCoin.org website in the near future as reference.

https://medium.com/@NAVCoin/navcoin-core-4-2-0-release-candidate-e41c22e95ac

NavPay 4.1 released. NavCore is now NavHub.




A major focus of the past few weeks for NavCoin Core has been creating a range of tools and resources to empower the NavCoin community to be confident contributors within the NavCoin ecosystem.

https://medium.com/@NAVCoin/navpay-4-1-released-navcore-is-now-navhub-ca2f00cc5041