Small Block

[minerpumpkin]

I don't know why some blocks have just a few transaction and other 1000+, it is weird in my opinion but it does happen.

Well the answer to your question has been outlined in several of the posts in this thread: It's called variance. Miners try to solve/find a block as fast as possible. It makes no sense for them to wait and include a given amount of transactions. Adding transactions only makes the block bigger (thus it becomes more likely for the block to become orphaned) and waiting for more transactions to come in has an incredibly negative EV.

What is an orphaned block? Is that one where there are several fringes and that block ends up on a fringe that gets left because another was solved first?

Yep, that's basically it. Just like odolvlobo has also explained this happens when there are two valid blocks mined (mostly roughly at the same time) and it now comes down to the next block that's being mined to which chain (both chains are actually valid until this point) it gets added. The one that gets left out will now most likely be abandoned.

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[panck4beer]

In the future after all the bitcoins have been released, wouldnt a small block such as this be extremely detrimental to the system? Suddenly your reward is based on the number of transactions, and no transaction = no reward...

[minerpumpkin]

In the future after all the bitcoins have been released, wouldnt a small block such as this be extremely detrimental to the system? Suddenly your reward is based on the number of transactions, and no transaction = no reward...

Well there wouldn't be any harm for you to publish the block, nonetheless. The general thinking goes like this, though: In the future, when the block-rewards have been weaned off, the number of transactions is supposed to be high enough to account for a reasonable fee for the miners. In that case you would wait until enough transactions have accumulated until it is economically viable for you to publish the block. Waiting may actually make some sense in that case in the future.

[SirChiko]

Blocks are not required to have any transactions in them.

i'm curious about this aspect... but the number of transactions per block is based on what? it's random?

It's based on how many transactions were broadcasted by the time while block was in process of solving, it isn't random lol and i don't see any rocket science in it, it's simple to understand.

[ensurance982]

Blocks are not required to have any transactions in them.

i'm curious about this aspect... but the number of transactions per block is based on what? it's random?

It's based on how many transactions were broadcasted by the time while block was in process of solving, it isn't random lol and i don't see any rocket science in it, it's simple to understand.

Well, sure it's simple to understand for people more familiar with the matter, but always remember that there are people who are new to this. And when I first got to know about Bitcoin I also didn't know how it worked. It even took me some time to understand that the transaction fees of the transactions go to the person solving the respective block that include the transactions - crazy in retrospect!

[ausbit]

Just seen this very small block,only one transaction.
https://blockchain.info/block/000000000000000009bf19c953cbcf0e2919dceec1c2107c4d93fdb2f948b2b8

[cr1776]

Just seen this very small block,only one transaction.
https://blockchain.info/block/000000000000000009bf19c953cbcf0e2919dceec1c2107c4d93fdb2f948b2b8

Miners can pick whatever transactions they wish to included in blocks, even zero (within the upper limits).

[cr1776]

This is actually interesting...


With these fast asics, they can find blocks so fast now, it is unpredictable when they will be found...

Recently, I had to wait 2 HOURS for a transaction to get 1 confirmation...

These are two different issues. Block times are adjusted every (roughly) two weeks so that the block frequency will be close to an average of every ten minutes.  Your confirmation time will vary based on many factors, including fees paid, number of transactions queued, the number of transactions the people who find the blocks decide to include in each block, whether the transaction included inputs that were unconfirmed etc.

[altcoinex]

large fees or short block time.

Short block time? No one actually defines the block time deliberately! Fees also don't affect the time between blocks at all! Miners just try to find a new block as fast as possible and as soon as they find one, they publish it. Waiting for more transactions would be very risky, because you would end up risking your block-reward!

And a terrible risk! If you added more transactions, the block would change and the hash would be different, so you would have to re mine the block entirely -- not likely to beat someone else in doing so. A miner also isn't going to waste time NOT mining just because they don't have enough TX's and want to get more fees -- the fees arn't likely to surpass the 25BTC block reward. They will mine constantly regardless of the amount of TX, and will solve lve a block before having many or even any TX that qualify for their miners tx rules..

In the future after all the bitcoins have been released, wouldnt a small block such as this be extremely detrimental to the system? Suddenly your reward is based on the number of transactions, and no transaction = no reward...

The hope is that either (or more likely a combination of both):
A - The price will increase due to no new coins being produced/entering the market and increased use worldwide, making just TX fee's with no other block reward still have a significant amount of value and be worth mining for.
B - Either the amount/demand of transactions will increase and the fee amounts will endup higher out of need to ensure TX make it into a block.

[Cinnob0n]

Blocks can be found as soon in less than a minute! Or they could possibly take a couple of hours. Rare for either them to happen though.