[ANN] Vcoin sha256 pow

[gjhiggins]

A short progress report: - The upgrade to Core 0.11 available for testing on testnet.

The upgrade's pretty much done, testnet is now accessible to 0.11 nodes. Linux source code is downloadable and ready to roll.

After people have had a chance to kick the tyres, the next step will be to reach out to Bleutrade, see if there's anything they need from us.

VCoin 0.11 is the default branch in the vcoincore repos: https://github.com/gjhiggins/vcoincore.git

Code:

$ git branch -a
* vcoin-0.11
  remotes/origin/HEAD -> origin/vcoin-0.11
  remotes/origin/master
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11.feature.chat.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11.feature.explore.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11.feature.overviewplus.tab
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11.feature.trade.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin-0.11.prerelease
  remotes/origin/vcoin.0.11.feature.charts.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.charts.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.chat.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.explore.window
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.overviewplus.tab
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.prerelease
  remotes/origin/vcoin.feature.trade.window

VCoin replicates the upstream distinction between stable release and in-development master approach.

Features are maintained in separate branches for reasons of sanity. This also effectively preserves a differentiation between the “vanilla” codebase, sans branches and a “prosumer” version that integrates all the features.

So ...

* 0.11 release vanilla = git checkout vcoin-0.11 (the default)
* 0.11 release prosumer = git checkout vcoin-0.11.prerelease
* development vanilla = git checkout master
* development prosumer = git checkout vcoin.feature.prerelease

Newly-launched 0.11+ nodes on mainnet will not recognise blocks submitted by 0.8 nodes but will recognise blocks submitted by other 0.11 nodes and so a blockchain fork will inevitably occur - the 0.8 clients mining one fork and the 0.11 clients mining another. And this is okay, it is expected, if not indefinitely sustainable because when the switchover occurs, the 0.8 blockchain at that point will become the new 0.11 blockchain, obliterating the previous “unofficial” one.

Just be clear: MINING THE TEMPORARY 0.11 MAINNET BLOCKCHAIN IS FEASIBLE BUT FUTILE.

Pragmatism rather dictates that the chain being used by Bleutrade (as the one and only exchange listing VCN) is probably going to have some influence on which chain is collectively perceived as the “right” one.

I don't expect folks to jump without looking, so feel free to thrash the testnet.

Recommended working practice:

Code:

cd /tmp/
git clone https://github.com/gjhiggins/vcoincore.git
cd vcoincore
./autogen.sh
./configure --with-incompatible-bdb --with-gui=qt5
make
cp -R ${HOME}/.vcoin ${HOME}/.vcoincore
./src/qt/vcoin-qt -datadir="${HOME}/.vcoincore" -testnet

Currently, the daemon, tx and cli binaries are compiled as “bitcoind”, “bitcoin-tx” and “bitcoin-cli”. For purity, they can just be renamed as vcoind, vcoin-tx and vcoin-cli.

I do recommend you try the prosumer version, adds information-related features at only a slight network cost (of occasional calls on Bleutrade's API).

Obligatory screengrab:




Cheers

Graham

[1715076312]

1715076312

[1715076312]

1715076312

[1715076312]

1715076312

[gjhiggins]

Why 0.11? Primarily because 0.10 embraces P2SH addresses:

“Standard script rules relaxed for P2SH addresses

The IsStandard() rules have been almost completely removed for P2SH redemption scripts, allowing applications to make use of any valid script type, such as "n-of-m OR y", hash-locked oracle addresses, etc. While the Bitcoin protocol has always supported these types of script, actually using them on mainnet has been previously inconvenient as standard Bitcoin Core nodes wouldn't relay them to miners, nor would most miners include them in blocks they mined.”

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/v0.10.0/doc/release-notes.md#standard-script-rules-relaxed-for-p2sh-addresses

Another reason is the establishment of a consensus library:

“Starting from 0.10.0, the Bitcoin Core distribution includes a consensus library.

The purpose of this library is to make the verification functionality that is critical to Bitcoin's consensus available to other applications, e.g. to language bindings such as python-bitcoinlib or alternative node implementations.

This library is called libbitcoinconsensus.so (or, .dll for Windows). Its interface is defined in the C header bitcoinconsensus.h.

In its initial version the API includes two functions:

* bitcoinconsensus_verify_script verifies a script. It returns whether the indicated input of the provided serialized transaction correctly spends the passed scriptPubKey under additional constraints indicated by flags
* bitcoinconsensus_version returns the API version, currently at an experimental 0

The functionality is planned to be extended to e.g. UTXO management in upcoming releases, but the interface for existing methods should remain stable.”

And in 0.11, there's:
https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/0.11/doc/release-notes.md

“Privacy: Disable wallet transaction broadcast

This release adds an option -walletbroadcast=0 to prevent automatic transaction broadcast and rebroadcast (#5951). This option allows separating transaction submission from the node functionality.

Making use of this, third-party scripts can be written to take care of transaction (re)broadcast:

* Send the transaction as normal, either through RPC or the GUI
* Retrieve the transaction data through RPC using gettransaction (NOT getrawtransaction). The hex field of the result will contain the raw hexadecimal representation of the transaction
* The transaction can then be broadcasted through arbitrary mechanisms supported by the script

One such application is selective Tor usage, where the node runs on the normal internet but transactions are broadcast over Tor.”

And Tor is better integrated in 0.11:

“Privacy: Stream isolation for Tor

This release adds functionality to create a new circuit for every peer connection, when the software is used with Tor. The new option, -proxyrandomize, is on by default.

When enabled, every outgoing connection will (potentially) go through a different exit node. That significantly reduces the chance to get unlucky and pick a single exit node that is either malicious, or widely banned from the P2P network. This improves connection reliability as well as privacy, especially for the initial connections.

Important note: If a non-Tor SOCKS5 proxy is configured that supports authentication, but doesn't require it, this change may cause that proxy to reject connections. A user and password is sent where they weren't before. This setup is exceedingly rare, but in this case -proxyrandomize=0 can be passed to disable the behavior.”

And then there's additional stuff that catches the eye, such as dooglus’  :

“broadcast the resulting hex value using https://just-dice.com/pushtx”

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=623147.msg11648787#msg11648787

Pretty much all of which is new ground to be explored, I feel.

Cheers

Graham

[samspaces]

Impressed by all the efforts, this coin may just go places.

[jc12345]

Impressed by all the efforts, this coin may just go places.

Agreed. Supporting this one as well.

[gjhiggins]

A brief progress report.

Wrestling with the charting code, I noticed that qcustomplot had been upgraded earlier this year and had gained a couple of finance-oriented chart widgets: a Candlestick widget and an OHLC widget. After brief experimentation, I chose the OHLC widget:



and the horizontal slider bar reveals the Order Depth chart:



Updated code committed to vcoincore.features.prerelease repos

Cheers

Graham

[gjhiggins]

Why 0.11? Primarily because 0.10 embraces P2SH addresses:

A somewhat better primary reason: 0.11 is the first version of Bitcoin Core to have the 80-byte OP_RETURN as default.

80 bytes allows full SHA256 hashes to be stored as “additional data” on the blockchain.

Have you an electronic document/image/dataset that you want date- and/or content-stamped?

Generate a hash of the item and inscribe the hash on the blockchain.

Coinspark offer the service: http://coinspark.org/


Not unrelatedly, TIL about Time-Lock Encryption:

Time-lock encryption is a method to encrypt a message such that it can only be decrypted after a certain deadline has passed. A computationally powerful adversary should not be able to learn the message before the deadline. However, even receivers with relatively weak computational resources should immediately be able to decrypt after the deadline, without any interaction with the sender, other receivers, or a trusted third party.

from: “How to Build Time-Lock Encryption” - Tibor Jager

We propose a new time-release protocol based on the bitcoin protocol and witness encryption. We derive a “public key” from the bitcoin block chain for encryption. The decryption key are the unpredictable information in the future blocks (e.g., transactions, nonces) that will be computed by the bitcoin network. We build this protocol by witness encryption and encrypt with the bitcoin proof-of-work constraints. The novelty of our protocol is that the decryption key will be automatically and publicly available in the bitcoin block chain when the time is due.

from “Time-release Protocol from Bitcoin and Witness Encryption for SAT” - Jia Liu and Flavio Garcia and Mark Ryan


Cheers,

Graham

[jc12345]

Vcoin rewards has halved to 25.

[chrisvl]

Vcoin rewards has halved to 25.

just see it

[chrisvl]

http://gcpool.ddns.net/vcoin/public

Happy Mining ;-)

its the server down ??

[glen123]

will be online soon . Hardware Changed .

Edit : DONE

happy mining

[gjhiggins]

A short progress report.

I'm working my way through the commit history of elements, integrating some of the features into VCoin 0.11 ...

What is Elements?

Elements is a collection of experiments to bring more technical innovation to Bitcoin.

What is Elements Alpha?

https://github.com/ElementsProject/elements/tree/alpha

Elements Alpha is the Elements project's first experimental test chain.

Compared to Bitcoin itself, it adds the following features:

• Confidential Transactions
• Segregated Witness
• Relative Lock Time
• Schnorr Signatures
• Additional opcodes
• Deterministic Peg (pegged to Bitcoin's testnet currency).
• Signed Blocks

That's quite a shopping list. The items are too experimental to feature in Bitcoin right now, they might upset the applecart and could seriously diminish Bitcoin's value if things went badly wrong. VCoin has no such handicap to speak of and is an eminently suitable vehicle for offering innovative services enabled by these features.

Some of the power-ups are easy to obtain because they are contained in a single commit, I can just cherry-pick the commit and merge it. Some are much more challenging, requiring extensive re-factoring from 0.10.2 to 0.11.

Elements runs on its own Bitcoin-protocol testnet, the services haven't been exhaustively tested, nor does any trace of them appear in the wallet GUI.

It's a shopping list of ingredients, not ready-meals. Cuisine has yet to happen.

Cheers

Graham

[chrisvl]

A short progress report.

I'm working my way through the commit history of elements, integrating some of the features into VCoin 0.11 ...

What is Elements?

Elements is a collection of experiments to bring more technical innovation to Bitcoin.

What is Elements Alpha?

https://github.com/ElementsProject/elements/tree/alpha

Elements Alpha is the Elements project's first experimental test chain.

Compared to Bitcoin itself, it adds the following features:

• Confidential Transactions
• Segregated Witness
• Relative Lock Time
• Schnorr Signatures
• Additional opcodes
• Deterministic Peg (pegged to Bitcoin's testnet currency).
• Signed Blocks

That's quite a shopping list. The items are too experimental to feature in Bitcoin right now, they might upset the applecart and could seriously diminish Bitcoin's value if things went badly wrong. VCoin has no such handicap to speak of and is an eminently suitable vehicle for offering innovative services enabled by these features.

Some of the power-ups are easy to obtain because they are contained in a single commit, I can just cherry-pick the commit and merge it. Some are much more challenging, requiring extensive re-factoring from 0.10.2 to 0.11.

Elements runs on its own Bitcoin-protocol testnet, the services haven't been exhaustively tested, nor does any trace of them appear in the wallet GUI.

It's a shopping list of ingredients, not ready-meals. Cuisine has yet to happen.

Cheers

Graham

This is intrest..

[jc12345]

A short progress report.

I'm working my way through the commit history of elements, integrating some of the features into VCoin 0.11 ...

What is Elements?

Elements is a collection of experiments to bring more technical innovation to Bitcoin.

What is Elements Alpha?

https://github.com/ElementsProject/elements/tree/alpha

Elements Alpha is the Elements project's first experimental test chain.

Compared to Bitcoin itself, it adds the following features:

• Confidential Transactions
• Segregated Witness
• Relative Lock Time
• Schnorr Signatures
• Additional opcodes
• Deterministic Peg (pegged to Bitcoin's testnet currency).
• Signed Blocks

That's quite a shopping list. The items are too experimental to feature in Bitcoin right now, they might upset the applecart and could seriously diminish Bitcoin's value if things went badly wrong. VCoin has no such handicap to speak of and is an eminently suitable vehicle for offering innovative services enabled by these features.

Some of the power-ups are easy to obtain because they are contained in a single commit, I can just cherry-pick the commit and merge it. Some are much more challenging, requiring extensive re-factoring from 0.10.2 to 0.11.

Elements runs on its own Bitcoin-protocol testnet, the services haven't been exhaustively tested, nor does any trace of them appear in the wallet GUI.

It's a shopping list of ingredients, not ready-meals. Cuisine has yet to happen.

Cheers

Graham

This looks great - thanks.

Just a question on the solo mining capability of the new wallet. Will it also by reference drop the getwork protocol causing older miners not being able to mine solo and therefore only working with stratum pools?

This is what I am talking about that is relevant to the post Bitcoin v0.10 wallet.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=970195.0
and
https://bitcoin.org/en/release/v0.10.0#mining-and-relay-policy-enhancements

[gjhiggins]

Just a question on the solo mining capability of the new wallet. Will it also by reference drop the getwork protocol causing older miners not being able to mine solo and therefore only working with stratum pools?

Oooooh, good catch. I hadn't spotted that.

I agree, such a strongly Bitcoin-specific orientation is inappropriate for an alt. It severely reduces the appeal of 0.10+ Core versions of the Bitcoin reference client, I shall have to reconsider the strategy because it doesn't look promising at this point.

Cheers

Graham

[jc12345]

Just a question on the solo mining capability of the new wallet. Will it also by reference drop the getwork protocol causing older miners not being able to mine solo and therefore only working with stratum pools?

Oooooh, good catch. I hadn't spotted that.

I agree, such a strongly Bitcoin-specific orientation is inappropriate for an alt. It severely reduces the appeal of 0.10+ Core versions of the Bitcoin reference client, I shall have to reconsider the strategy because it doesn't look promising at this point.

Cheers

Graham

It does not have to be a problem. It only affects solo mining with older miners. As long as there is a stratum pool like there is currently it is fine. Futility of solo POW mining is an indicator of a successful coin and progressing with the times is an indication of strong coin management. Therefore, over time if vcoin is successfully managed and appealing, solo mining will become futile anyways.

I would still recommend that the work on 0.10+ should continue and that the differentiating factor of vcoin is its closeness to Bitcoin providing traceability to the Bitcoin core and compatibility with Bitcoin value added services, but with enhanced specs like the quicker block time and so on. Other services can be be added on, but the core must stay in sync with the reference client. Most alt-coins stick to 0.8 or 0.9 clients and that to me is an indication of poor coding skills and devs just copying each other wallets for their scams and short term plans. Coins sticking to pre 0.10 is bound to the past with little prospects of enhancing technically past 0.9 and must have superior coin management and business plans to counter that, so that its wallet just becomes a lesser technicality in the process and a mere vehicle for moving and storing coins.

Important aspects imo for vcoin would be the following:
- reference core that stays in sync with the changes in Bitcoin core. This would also enhance compatibility with value added services  created for Bitcoin that could be easily migrated to vcoin if people and companies so wanted.
- traceability to the core
- enhancements on top of the core that would be a good idea for Bitcoin, but probably not implemented currently because the core team does not want to take "risks" with the main chain.
- enhanced value added services by coin management and if coin management can ensure superior services that would mean a viable and promising alternative to Bitcoin.

[chrisvl]

Graham have setup a blockexplorer for vcoin and there are api available

Explorer https://minkiz.co/abe/chain/vcoin

https://minkiz.co/abe/chain/vcoin/q/totalbc  shows the amount of currency ever mined.
https://minkiz.co/abe/chain/vcoin/q/addressbalance/ + address /  check vcoin address balance
For more api check here https://minkiz.co/abe/q

[gjhiggins]

I would still recommend that the work on 0.10+ should continue and that the differentiating factor of vcoin is its closeness to Bitcoin providing traceability to the Bitcoin core and compatibility with Bitcoin value added services, but with enhanced specs like the quicker block time and so on.

Just too keep folks in the loop, I PM'd jc12345 with thanks for the comment, insights, kind words and indicated that I shared the above viewpoint.

Ever keen not to shut off opportunities to contribute hash to the rate, I decanted the 0.8 getwork code into a separate branch, haven't had time even to assess the amount of effort likely to be involved in re-integrating the approach to the 0.11 structure (assuming that the 0.11 structure isn't now basically inimical to the principles underpinning the getwork approach).

I have strong reasons to believe that the folks who have developed a fancy for following the monthly P&D Sheeplechase Trophy will take a while to cotton on to the fact that newly-launched 0.8.x clones are basically using obsolete code and represent a poor offer to put before P&D punters, let alone any hypothetical genuine investors.

Anyway, in lieu of anything coherent w.r.t. to progress, this is my current reading/working focus:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=623147.0 <- CLAMS' OP_RETURN ClamSpeech feature

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1102062 <- Trent Russell's Multisig Derivatives

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1078338.0 <- Discussions of approximations of a decentralised exchange

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1085436.0;all <- Compact Confidential Transactions for Bitcoin

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1101437.0;all  <- BIP 0065

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=322828.msg11383992#msg11383992 <- a Skeincoin-based OP_RETURN service

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1070124.msg11452127#msg11452127 <- Synergy's OP_RETURN service

https://github.com/viacoin/viacoin/pull/23 <- ViaCoin's OP_CHECKLOCKTIMEVERIFY implementation.

https://github.com/ElementsProject/elements/commits/checklocktimeverify <- Elements'  OP_CHECKLOCKTIMEVERIFY implementation

et. al.

Cheers

Graham

[chrisvl]

gcpool like down umine.co.uk is up http://www.umine.co.uk/getting_started

[crunck]

gcpool like down umine.co.uk is up http://www.umine.co.uk/getting_started

My pool is all ways up

And if there even is a problem just let me know and I will solve it

[chrisvl]

gcpool its online gcpool.ddns.net/vcoin/public/index.php?page=statistics&action=pool