I downloaded the bitcoin core wallet, what now?

[FruitsBasket]

-snip-
That is very confusing, I think I will stick to blockchain then and backup my privte key.
If I have my private key, that is good enough for getting my coins back if I loose access to the wallet?

Each address has a private key, if you use bitcoin core it will create and use more addresses, e.g. for change. If you only received coins on one address and never spend any coins you can just export the private key and import it into a different wallet/serivce. I think multibit or electrum are more up your alley, they only need a single backup of the seed and sync quickly. It will cover all keys (unless those imported). Maybe create a wallet and just look at it for a bit without having any coins in it.

Yes, I will look into multibit or electrum. When I am fully synched with my wallet then I need to lock it or not?
And then after locking save wallet .dat and copy the ptivate key?

Just another newbie question: saving private key means copying the text and paste somewhere u can always reach(on paper and usb)??

[shorena]

-snip-
That is very confusing, I think I will stick to blockchain then and backup my privte key.
If I have my private key, that is good enough for getting my coins back if I loose access to the wallet?

Each address has a private key, if you use bitcoin core it will create and use more addresses, e.g. for change. If you only received coins on one address and never spend any coins you can just export the private key and import it into a different wallet/serivce. I think multibit or electrum are more up your alley, they only need a single backup of the seed and sync quickly. It will cover all keys (unless those imported). Maybe create a wallet and just look at it for a bit without having any coins in it.

Yes, I will look into multibit or electrum. When I am fully synched with my wallet then I need to lock it or not?

Well if you dont really use it you might as well set no password and just move the coins out of there. If you plan to use any wallet for a longer time you should get a good password for it.

And then after locking save wallet .dat and copy the ptivate key?

The private key(s) are in the wallet.dat yes. If you set a password the private keys are encrypted in the file.

Just another newbie question: saving private key means copying the text and paste somewhere u can always reach(on paper and usb)??

Depends on the wallet. MultibitHD and Electrum have seed words you can write on paper. Bitcoin core has the wallet.dat file you would make copies of.

[fricircled]

I have the same issue.. it takes sometime to sync...I just leave my laptop,  for it  to sync, I haven't check it yet if it had already sync its time.. I installed it just the other day,.. 

they said that its a good wallet and a secure one too...

You need a lot of space in your computer. At present, it needs 56GB harddisk space in my PC. The requirement will rise fast next year when bitcoin becomes popular.

[FruitsBasket]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

[lastuser]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

[FruitsBasket]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

[ranochigo]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.*

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

* I believe there is more story to it. I can't understand it well and can't give a good explanation.

[FruitsBasket]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

So I only need to download the v3 blockchain, is that correct? If yes, what wallet should I use, an SPV or Electrum/Multibit?

[ranochigo]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

So I only need to download the v3 blockchain, is that correct? If yes, what wallet should I use, an SPV or Electrum/Multibit?

No. SPV clients only verify the block headers. They trust the miners to enforce the rules and follow the longest chain. SPV clients are Electrum/Multibit. I prefer Electrum though. Anyway, this problem existed with Bitcoin Core below 0.9.5 and hence it's a must to upgrade the client regularly.

Edit: SPV clients are actually safe if the client connects to a node that enforces the correct network rules. Electrum automatically go for the node that has the longest chain so you need to edit the preference to prevent going to the wrong fork.

[FruitsBasket]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

So I only need to download the v3 blockchain, is that correct? If yes, what wallet should I use, an SPV or Electrum/Multibit?

No. SPV clients only verify the block headers. They trust the miners to enforce the rules and follow the longest chain. SPV clients are Electrum/Multibit. I prefer Electrum though. Anyway, this problem existed with Bitcoin Core below 0.9.5 and hence it's a must to upgrade the client regularly.

So the miners can manipulate the blockchain?

Thank you for you suggestion, I will stop my bitcoin core wallet because I dont want 60 gb to be wasted.

[Blawpaw]

Pretty normal situation for someone who wants to use Bitcoin Core. Meaning you need to download and sync all the blockchain information since the genisis block. AFter that, you have a running node and helping the network stay decentralized

[FruitsBasket]

Pretty normal situation for someone who wants to use Bitcoin Core. Meaning you need to download and sync all the blockchain information since the genisis block. AFter that, you have a running node and helping the network stay decentralized

If no one would have the bitcoin core wallet, then bitcoin would be a dead coin?
Or is the blockchain also hosted by companies, like blockchain, or is that different?

[ranochigo]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

So I only need to download the v3 blockchain, is that correct? If yes, what wallet should I use, an SPV or Electrum/Multibit?

No. SPV clients only verify the block headers. They trust the miners to enforce the rules and follow the longest chain. SPV clients are Electrum/Multibit. I prefer Electrum though. Anyway, this problem existed with Bitcoin Core below 0.9.5 and hence it's a must to upgrade the client regularly.

So the miners can manipulate the blockchain?

Thank you for you suggestion, I will stop my bitcoin core wallet because I dont want 60 gb to be wasted.

Full nodes verify each block to ensure that it follow the rules and consider them as invalid if they do. However, in the fork, clients running 0.9.4 and below thought that it was valid and proporgated it. Since SPV Clients do not verify the entire block, they thought it was valid too. I don't find it to be a huge drawback from using an SPV client unless you are a merchant which process large transactions on a daily basis.

Pretty normal situation for someone who wants to use Bitcoin Core. Meaning you need to download and sync all the blockchain information since the genisis block. AFter that, you have a running node and helping the network stay decentralized

If no one would have the bitcoin core wallet, then bitcoin would be a dead coin?
Or is the blockchain also hosted by companies, like blockchain, or is that different?

If no one is running a full node, Bitcoin would not exist. There must be at least one Bitcoin Core client running at all times. Services like Blockchain.info, Blocktrail.com all run a full node to keep track of the data.

[FruitsBasket]

Any wallet where I don't have to download the whole blockchain?

SPV wallets like Electrum, MultiBit don't download the entire Blockchain, just the block headers. This means that they do not verify the whole block but follows the longest chain that it can find. It presents a problem since it trust the miners and it was affected in the 4th July fork. However, this is a minor issue since most miners have stopped SPV mining.

What happened on 4th july? And what does SPV mining mean, like staking?

On July 4, majority of the blocks mined were V3 block and hence the network reaches consensus to switch to v3 blocks. On that day, a miner mined a v2 block which was considered invalid under v3 and hence miners rejected it and bitcoin Core V0.9.5+. However, miners running SPV mining continued on that wrong chain which resulted in those Bitcoins mined in those invalid blocks being invalid and there was a long block reorg for SPV clients(multibit/electrum etc) since it took time for big mining pools to switch to the correct fork.

No one reported any double spending attempts however. Miners SPV mine to eliminate verification time and thus reducing the stale rate.

So I only need to download the v3 blockchain, is that correct? If yes, what wallet should I use, an SPV or Electrum/Multibit?

No. SPV clients only verify the block headers. They trust the miners to enforce the rules and follow the longest chain. SPV clients are Electrum/Multibit. I prefer Electrum though. Anyway, this problem existed with Bitcoin Core below 0.9.5 and hence it's a must to upgrade the client regularly.

So the miners can manipulate the blockchain?

Thank you for you suggestion, I will stop my bitcoin core wallet because I dont want 60 gb to be wasted.

Full nodes verify each block to ensure that it follow the rules and consider them as invalid if they do. However, in the fork, clients running 0.9.4 and below thought that it was valid and proporgated it. Since SPV Clients do not verify the entire block, they thought it was valid too. I don't find it to be a huge drawback from using an SPV client unless you are a merchant which process large transactions on a daily basis.

Pretty normal situation for someone who wants to use Bitcoin Core. Meaning you need to download and sync all the blockchain information since the genisis block. AFter that, you have a running node and helping the network stay decentralized

If no one would have the bitcoin core wallet, then bitcoin would be a dead coin?
Or is the blockchain also hosted by companies, like blockchain, or is that different?

If no one is running a full node, Bitcoin would not exist. There must be at least one Bitcoin Core client running at all times. Services like Blockchain.info, Blocktrail.com all run a full node to keep track of the data.

So bitcoin could go down if no one host the nodes, if this happens, can someone just download the node and host it on his computer? Or a computer can't handle that?

[ranochigo]

-snip-
So bitcoin could go down if no one host the nodes, if this happens, can someone just download the node and host it on his computer? Or a computer can't handle that?

If in a scenario, no one host a node, you would not be able to get the data of the new blocks from your peers. If you are the only person on earth to have a node, with no latest blockchain data, any data after your last Bitcoin block would be forgotten. Of course, you can mine the blocks and continue the blockchain but it is not plausible with the high difficulty.

[FruitsBasket]

-snip-
So bitcoin could go down if no one host the nodes, if this happens, can someone just download the node and host it on his computer? Or a computer can't handle that?

If in a scenario, no one host a node, you would not be able to get the data of the new blocks from your peers. If you are the only person on earth to have a node, with no latest blockchain data, any data after your last Bitcoin block would be forgotten. Of course, you can mine the blocks and continue the blockchain but it is not plausible with the high difficulty.

So once the blockchain goes down no one will be able to recover it?
If I run the bitcoin core wallet it says 6 peers, so only 6 people host the blockchain at that moment?

[ranochigo]

-snip-
So bitcoin could go down if no one host the nodes, if this happens, can someone just download the node and host it on his computer? Or a computer can't handle that?

If in a scenario, no one host a node, you would not be able to get the data of the new blocks from your peers. If you are the only person on earth to have a node, with no latest blockchain data, any data after your last Bitcoin block would be forgotten. Of course, you can mine the blocks and continue the blockchain but it is not plausible with the high difficulty.

So once the blockchain goes down no one will be able to recover it?
If I run the bitcoin core wallet it says 6 peers, so only 6 people host the blockchain at that moment?

Unless they run a node again or upload the latest blockchain elsewhere.

No. There are approximately more than 5047 Bitcoin nodes that has 8333 port opened. A Bitcoin node with default settings only allow 8 outgoing connection unless you open port 8333 which will enable incoming connections.

edit: oops I meant the other way round. changed.

[FruitsBasket]

I have the same issue.. it takes sometime to sync...I just leave my laptop,  for it  to sync, I haven't check it yet if it had already sync its time.. I installed it just the other day,.. 

they said that its a good wallet and a secure one too...

You need a lot of space in your computer. At present, it needs 56GB harddisk space in my PC. The requirement will rise fast next year when bitcoin becomes popular.

ouch... I uninstalled it already,.. can't use it if it consume that space in my hardisk plus the time that it will eat up my internet speed while it sync its time... just stopped it and use my coins.ph wallet.. 

What is a coin.ph wallet? Does that wallet need to sync with the network like the bitcoin core node?

[lite]

I have the same issue.. it takes sometime to sync...I just leave my laptop,  for it  to sync, I haven't check it yet if it had already sync its time.. I installed it just the other day,..  

they said that its a good wallet and a secure one too...

You need a lot of space in your computer. At present, it needs 56GB harddisk space in my PC. The requirement will rise fast next year when bitcoin becomes popular.

ouch... I uninstalled it already,.. can't use it if it consume that space in my hardisk plus the time that it will eat up my internet speed while it sync its time... just stopped it and use my coins.ph wallet..  

I've never heard of coins.ph!, i would recommend you to use electrum if you can't download full block chain.

[shorena]

I have the same issue.. it takes sometime to sync...I just leave my laptop,  for it  to sync, I haven't check it yet if it had already sync its time.. I installed it just the other day,..  

they said that its a good wallet and a secure one too...

You need a lot of space in your computer. At present, it needs 56GB harddisk space in my PC. The requirement will rise fast next year when bitcoin becomes popular.

ouch... I uninstalled it already,.. can't use it if it consume that space in my hardisk plus the time that it will eat up my internet speed while it sync its time... just stopped it and use my coins.ph wallet..  

I've never heard of coins.ph!, i would recommend you to use electrum if you can't download full block chain.

Its an online wallet service commonly used in the philippines.