Newbie! Just for a laugh - tips/help ? thx

[ytrebil]

Hey guys, read a NS article earlier about bitcoins - interesting.

Anyway, I used strongcoin to open an account and did some freebie stuff now my balance is showing as 5.0e-05 (not quite sure what that means, never mind!). So I decided to mine and installed 50Miner and my hahrate is 82mh/s - not great but it's not a fantastic graphics card.

A couple of questions...

1. is strongcoin okay to store my bitcoins? If not, what should I use and can I move my balance across?
2. What does Solutions: X mean on 50Miner?

I've a lot to learn about bitcoins but I like the idea.

Thanks.

[Winterfrost]

Hey guys, read a NS article earlier about bitcoins - interesting.

Anyway, I used strongcoin to open an account and did some freebie stuff now my balance is showing as 5.0e-05 (not quite sure what that means, never mind!). So I decided to mine and installed 50Miner and my hahrate is 82mh/s - not great but it's not a fantastic graphics card.

That means you have 0.00005 BTC (about $0.000625); a small amount.

1. is strongcoin okay to store my bitcoins? If not, what should I use and can I move my balance across?

It's probably alright for small amounts. I've always liked the wallet on blockchain.info, personally. The small amount you have is hardly worth moving and would likely have a hard time getting confirmed.

2. What does Solutions: X mean on 50Miner?

I've not used 50Miner, but it's probably how many valid shares you've submitted. Shares are a way of determining how much work each person contributing has done, so that the reward can be split fairly. See https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Pooled_mining for some useful explanations.

I've a lot to learn about bitcoins but I like the idea.

Thanks.

There's a lot of information to absorb, certainly. Hopefully I've been able to help some.

[ytrebil]

Hey guys, read a NS article earlier about bitcoins - interesting.

Anyway, I used strongcoin to open an account and did some freebie stuff now my balance is showing as 5.0e-05 (not quite sure what that means, never mind!). So I decided to mine and installed 50Miner and my hahrate is 82mh/s - not great but it's not a fantastic graphics card.

That means you have 0.00005 BTC (about $0.000625); a small amount.

1. is strongcoin okay to store my bitcoins? If not, what should I use and can I move my balance across?

It's probably alright for small amounts. I've always liked the wallet on blockchain.info, personally. The small amount you have is hardly worth moving and would likely have a hard time getting confirmed.

2. What does Solutions: X mean on 50Miner?

I've not used 50Miner, but it's probably how many valid shares you've submitted. Shares are a way of determining how much work each person contributing has done, so that the reward can be split fairly. See https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Pooled_mining for some useful explanations.

I've a lot to learn about bitcoins but I like the idea.

Thanks.

There's a lot of information to absorb, certainly. Hopefully I've been able to help some.

Thank you!

Does the 5 before the . indicate 5 bitcoins though, do you know?

[girafon]

Anyway, I used strongcoin to open an account and did some freebie stuff now my balance is showing as 5.0e-05 (not quite sure what that means, never mind!). So I decided to mine and installed 50Miner and my hahrate is 82mh/s - not great but it's not a fantastic graphics card.

Does the 5 before the . indicate 5 bitcoins though, do you know?

5.0e-05 means 5.0 * 10^-5

as winterfrost told you, this is 0.00005 BTC

[DannyHamilton]

 

  . . .my balance is showing as 5.0e-05 (not quite sure what that means. . .
  

 That means you have 0.00005 BTC (about $0.000625); a small amount.
 

. . .Does the 5 before the . indicate 5 bitcoins though, do you know?

No.

The 5 indicates that there is a 5 somewhere in the number.  The e-05 indicates that you need to move the decimal place 5 places to the left to get the actual number (It's called exponential notation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponential_notation ).

So it is indicating that you have 0.00005 bitcoins.  That would be 5 hundred-thousandths of a bitcoin which as a fraction simplifies to a twentythousandth of a bitcoin.  In otherwords, you'll need twenty thousand times that amount to have 1 bitcoin.

Perhaps you've seen the number written as 5.0 x 10^-5

[ytrebil]

Ah, yes 10 to the power of -5 makes more sense to me.

Thanks for clearing it up.

Informative forum you guys have.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Why the hell would strongcoin use scientific notation?  I can't think of any possible method which would be less user friendly.
Even putting it in mBTC or uBTC would be easier for the average user.

[meowmeowbrowncow]

Why the hell would strongcoin use scientific notation?  I can't think of any possible method which would be less user friendly.
Even putting it in mBTC or uBTC would be easier for the average user.

If the average person doesn't know scientific notation we are all going to hell.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Why the hell would strongcoin use scientific notation?  I can't think of any possible method which would be less user friendly.
Even putting it in mBTC or uBTC would be easier for the average user.

If the average person doesn't know scientific notation we are all going to hell.

It has nothing to do with the average user not knowing scientific notation it is the utter stupidity of using it in this circumstance.  It would be like writing speed limit sign as "SPEED LIMIT: 6.0 x10^1 MPH".

There are two characteristics which make it pointless.
a) the range of possible values for a wallet balance are well known and "relatively" small.  The smallest account balance is 0.00000001 BTC and the largest (eventually) is 21,000,000.0 BTC.  It isn't like trying to express a 256bit number which is cumbersome to express in standard notation.

b) generally speaking users want to know their EXACT balance, not an estimate.  So take a user with the balance of 0.12345678 BTC.   To express it in standard notation requires 10 characters.  To express it accurately in scientific notation (1.23456789E-8 BTC) requires  requires 13 characters.  So it is longer and less user friendly.  If the site is rounding balances well that just makes it even more confusing and will lead to other problems.

It is user unfriendly and serves no purpose.  My guess is it isn't intentional by the operator.

[RoyalBitcoin]

My guess is it isn't intentional by the operator.

Probably correct.  I have noticed that some JSON libraries automatically convert numbers to scientific notation.