I finally figured out the problem. I did not understand the Ubuntu Desktop and how it works. I found that the "File", "Wallet", "Tools" and "Help" menu is at the very top of the screen, and not included in the smaller window that Electrum is running in. I have been more used to the Window operating system, where these menu items appear within the smaller Electrum window.
The fact that these menu items do not show up at the top of the screen until you run the mouse up to them made it more difficult to figure out the problem.
I'm glad it turned out to be a misunderstanding of the Ubuntu system rather than a flaw in Electrum. Electrum works great, and I really like it!
Welcome to Ubuntu! |
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The FAQ says "Electrum uses a gap limit to stop looking for addresses, it is set to 5 by default, so the client get all addresses until 5 unused addresses are found." It doesn't say HOW-TO actually increase the number of addresses. Anyone? 1. open console tab 2. type in "wallet.storage.put('gap_limit',x)" without quotes around it, and replace x with the number of addresses you want it to create for unused addresses. (ie. if you have 5 unused addresses now, and you want to make 3 more, set it to 8. From then on, every time you use an address, it will create a new one so that you always have 8 unused addresses showing.) CAUTION: The way that Electrum works is to search for the balance in all addresses within the gap limit, so if you set the gap limit to 500, and use the 500th address to store bitcoin, you will have to set your gap limit to at least 500 every time you restore your seed, otherwise Electrum won't "see" your 500th address correctly. Because this is impractical, please use addresses in your Electrum wallet in the order that they were generated, and try not to increase your gap limit too high, as it will be cause for confusion in the future if you ever have to restore the wallet from seed. |
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Thank you Abdussamad!
So, if anyone ever sent me anything to one of these "used" addresses, I'd still receive it?
Yes, if you or anyone sends money to an address in the "used" area, it will be moved back into your active addresses. (One condition to decide what is a "used" address is "It must have a 0 balance") |
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why would he have it when these coins are unspendable if i'm correct
Because he is the one who said "As a rule of thumb, never delete any wallet" You never know when you need to prove ownership of an address you made. He knew this better than anyone else, and I highly doubt he would delete or otherwise get rid of the private key to it. It's historic. |
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Waiting on signed message from 12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX. (The address the genesis block sent to)
I don't think that anyone who created such a system would ever NOT back up the first Bitcoin address EVER USED. (ok, so not used, but received-ed?)
Signing a message with this address, verifying that his bitcointalk account was not compromised, and informing us that he is not the Satoshi from the article.
I assume Satoshi is a decent human being, and therefore he would make a move like this to clear the innocent man from the target on his back.
Unless this is a conspiracy to flush Satoshi out of hiding to get him to speak up in order to somehow track him...
And just in case you are doubting whether I, dabura667, am not the REAL Satoshi... here's proof!
Address:
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1DAbuRaxxycu6osPdmah4HaRFDw7zK3hzH
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Message:
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I, dabura667 (account on bitcointalk.org), guarantee I do not own the address 12c6DSiU4Rq3P4ZxziKxzrL5LmMBrzjrJX from the genesis block.
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Signature:
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G9eIt1rtj9JBQl+9Byfa3LbLrrENkuBwaI/vglCTSQ+JbVDbVi7g+gV+kJKGeo+7FNlVoNj8HkB0h9C9i5uq/CE=
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Hi Dabura,
Regarding the transaction confirmation bug, what you suggest is the only fix I didn't try, as other people said that gets rid of the history of the transactions, something I didn't want to lose. I don't know if this is accurate though, as I haven't tried it. If it's going to be fixed in the next release, I'll wait for that, as it doesn't affect me in any way (or perhaps it does, but I don't know it - can you confirm?), other than being a little annoying.
Regarding a paper wallet, it's really because I became worried reading various reports of lately how there are many (and more every day) malwares that are usually undetectable by normal anti-virus/malware software, and that they scan your computer for known wallet files, and steal them (or steal your BTC by some other way). This is why I wanted a paper wallet, so that I can transfer the majority of my balance into it, where I believe it would be far safer (as long as I don't lose it or it gets destroyed). I just got confused by the number of options (bitaddress.org you mention being one of them) out there, each one touting it's advantages over the other one, and I also became worried and even more confused reading about the peculiar way these paper wallets work in when you want to transfer the funds OUT of them into a "live" wallet to use - something about "change addresses", and how some of the balance goes into these addresses, and if you're not careful, you can lose some or all of the balance... I found a long thread about this on reddit and read it all, but just ended up even more confused, even though there were helpful people there trying to explain it (as well as lots of people like me who were just quite confused about it all).
Thanks, I'll get it eventually.
Deleting blockchain_headers file does not clear your history. You're fine. As far as paper wallets are concerned, the issue with paper wallets and change addresses stems from the concept of paper wallets coming about AFTER certain bitcoin software has been in corculation. When sending bitcoin, all you're really doing is taking a transaction RECEIVED by the address, splitting it into three parts, the send amount, the change amount, and the miner fee, and then broadcasting those three outputs to the network so that the two addresses both get the bitcoin intended and the miner fee gets bundled in the block you are included in. By default, a lot of software would always send your change to a new address, and some software wouldn't even display that address, so a lot of people lost bitcoin from not understanding this and backing up their entire wallet files. However, nowadays, apps like Mycelium for Android have a paper wallet usage feature that sets the paper wallet address ITSELF as the change address for you automatically. This means if you send 10btc to your paper wallet, then spend two, you send two to the recipient, then send 8 back into your paper wallet (minus whatever you set as a fee) If you want to be super careful, ubuntu LIVE USB or something similar that has never touched the internet should suffice. Then all you need to do is download bitaddress.org as an html file (ctrl s on your browser) and tranfer it to your ubuntu. Print your paper wallet, and you're good. Having an Android phone then also means you can use myceliums paper wallet spending function, so carry a paper wallet with a small amount with you and maybe a few ones with larger amounts for your safe. No need for armory etc. Paper wallet swiping in Electrum would be a nice function. I will try to see if I can make something this weekend. |
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Thanks for taking the time to reply.
I think I'll continue to investigate this, I'd rater be safe than sorry, but what you said is reassuring.
1. The transaction confirmation bug will be fixed in the next release. Ways to fix it include deleting your blockchain_headers file which is in the parent directory above your wallet folder. After deleting it, start electrum and wait for it to re-download. Then click open wallet and pick your default wallet, even if its already open. And open it. This should fix the problem. Paper wallet/wise... What exactly do you want to do with the paper wallet? Why can't you use bitaddress.org etc. to make your paper wallets? |
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http://pastebin.com/MZjbf23AI made this for friends in Japanese and translated to English. Feel free to use it to help with electrum offline wallet. Thanks!
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Besides increasing the chance of getting hacked? Nope.
The higher the number of computers with your seed on it, the more likely you are to get hacked, but if that's a non-issue, then you're fine.
All info is stored on the same blockchain, transaction-wise.
As far as passwords, Contacts lists (often used addresses) and transaction labels (notes you can place on trasactions to remind yourself what they were for) are concerned, these will not be synchronized between the two computers.
Other than that, no problem.
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I also added the ability to set your own fee and set your own change address with a csv import. format: 15mAaJjKRwHaH2XE5Q8Nc9QWm1vTZaVUHB, 0.001 < This is a normal bitcoin send row.
fee, 0.0001 < This is the fee amount you wish to set for the transaction (in BTC).
change, 1QCjHCCaifSFDMaR4KWDAfowZJiiqi7m7U < This is the address you would like to send your "change" to. (This must be one of your own addresses) This function along with the error fix from above is at the following link. https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/pull/578/filesCool, this seems really useful. Thanks. Good thing I saw your comment, because it made me go in and fix it so that you couldn't set a change address as one you don't own. Then I ran into an issue where the leading space after the comma was being put into the change address... this is now fixed. |
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Can I make a friendly suggestion. I have a list of hundreds of customers whom I pay weekly, and when I create a new CSV transaction and paste the list, I am never shown which line is faulty if any of them are. The only way I can get around this is through "process of elimination" by pasting small chunks of the list at a time. I do this about 50 times until I narrow it down to the 2-3 lines which had invalid bitcoin addresses or other strange oddities.
Hoping for better error handling from this client eventually.. thanks.
Fixed! This will tell you which addresses were erroneous. It also lists which row in the csv that address was in. https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/pull/582/filesI also added the ability to set your own fee and set your own change address with a csv import. format: 15mAaJjKRwHaH2XE5Q8Nc9QWm1vTZaVUHB, 0.001 < This is a normal bitcoin send row.
fee, 0.0001 < This is the fee amount you wish to set for the transaction (in BTC).
change, 1QCjHCCaifSFDMaR4KWDAfowZJiiqi7m7U < This is the address you would like to send your "change" to. (This must be one of your own addresses) This function along with the error fix from above is at the following link. https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/pull/578/files |
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Is it true that if the seed is compromised, then everything is lost, even if I encrypted the wallet with a strong password?
If so, since the seed is not encrypted, it is much more easy to be compromised, then maybe it is better to not know the seed at all (at least I have backup of the encrypted wallet)?
Of course you could put the seed in a text file and encrypt that file, but backup the wallet file is even less complicated
The seed is basically your "master private key." Using this, an attacker can basically recreate your entire electrum wallet, sans imported private keys, labels etc... If you don't want the seed to be unencrypted, don't save it anywhere. Electrum requires a password to create a wallet, so as soon as you put your password in, your seed is encrypted. If your wallet file is ever cracked, they will have access to your seed and all of your private keys, but as long as they don't crack your wallet file's password and you don't paste the seed anywhere, no one is going to get your wallet. If you're worried about the scenario: "What if I create an electrum wallet with a screen recorder/clipboard recorder/key logger malware on my pc and my seed gets stolen?" Then I guess you would be justified, but if you have a virus, I would send all bitcoins to a paper wallet, delete all wallets, wipe my computer of viruses, and if I were super paranoid reformat my entire OS. I highly recommend Electrum's offline wallet functionality if you're worried about security. You can install it to an Ubuntu Live USB, and sign your transactions from the USB's OS, while keeping a watch-only wallet on your online computer for giving out addresses, keeping track of your bitcoins, etc. If you would like more detailed instructions on creating a Live USB to install Electrum offline, let me know. If you use it normally, it is just as secure as any other wallet software. If you write the seed on paper and keep it somewhere safe... you will always have access to your bitcoins. （However, so will an attacker if he gets your paper... but that's the same as a paper wallet, too.) |
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I am interested to learn how to make my own standalone exe for windows. I am using py2exe, but I am getting many errors and I can not make into one single exe. If you have any links to tutorials or advice on how to change files to make py2exe bundle option 1 to make single exe (or whatever method you use) I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you very much! |
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As long as you have your seed you will not have a problem.
I use Electrum.
Your computer can crash or do whatever it wants, as long as you have the seed you are up and running again.
You can download the client on any computer anywhere and it will always be there.
if using multiple computers they will all synchronise.
I changed from BTC QT for the reasons above.
I still keep QT current, but do not use, just to help the network.
Been looking for an additional spot to store some coins, you just sold me on electrum  It's a great client. Learn how to make an offline wallet and watch-only counterpart on an online computer. Super safe! |
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https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/pull/573I had made an issue request a while back, but after a while I realized that no one really seemed to want this functionality (or at least no one on github) So I went and started learning python, and tinkering around. Maybe a total of 30-40 hours of messing around with pdb stepping through code to figure out things work, I have finally gotten a working, if slightly primitive and very sloppy, version. If anyone could look at my function, look at my pull request, look at how I comment, etc. and give me feedback on anything (github manners, best practices for python, ways to improve my function, anything) I would greatly appreciate it. I have had so much fun, I started to program some small game in pygame. I feel very proud of my accomplishment, but I realize that this is a molehill and not a mountain I have climbed. I would greatly appreciate any feedback. If for nothing else, this helps me and my set up very nicely. Thank you in advanced for your feedback and opinions. dabura :-)
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