Need forum's help on study material

[tkredmond]

I am new to mining and the world of blockchain. I am slowly learning mostly from online articles, youtube videos, and so on.

I wonder if there is something you can point me to to dive in further.

In particular: When i read a thread about mining zcash for example, people talk about difficulty, nonce, emission curve, difficulty target, algorithms, block reward formula, confirmations and many fancy exotic terms that i am totally not familiar with.

Is there a book or any other source you can point to, that has an explanation of all these terms? Something like "all you need to know about how currencies work and their technologies"?

I understand that crypto-currencies is not one field only. It is maths, programming, many different disciplines.

I have downloaded Andrea's "Mastering bitcoin" which seems to be covering a lot.

If you think there is some other comprehensive guide that might accelerate learning, i would appreciate your feedback.

many thanx

[1714546447]

1714546447

[1714546447]

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[1714546447]

1714546447

[Velkro]

In particular: When i read a thread about mining zcash for example, people talk about difficulty, nonce, emission curve, difficulty target, algorithms, block reward formula, confirmations and many fancy exotic terms that i am totally not familiar with.

I will write what i know.
Difficulty is a refference to how much computing power you need to mine same block with same reward for example 15 BTC. Difficulty goes up, u must use more computing power to mine same amount.
Nonce is from computer programming language something.
Emission curve is a refference to block reward for miners. Bitcoin started from 50 bitcoin as block reward and gets halved each 4 years. You can calculate emission by that up to limit of 21 000 000 bitcoins.
Algorithms are also from computer programming term.

[tkredmond]

In particular: When i read a thread about mining zcash for example, people talk about difficulty, nonce, emission curve, difficulty target, algorithms, block reward formula, confirmations and many fancy exotic terms that i am totally not familiar with.

I will write what i know.
Difficulty is a refference to how much computing power you need to mine same block with same reward for example 15 BTC. Difficulty goes up, u must use more computing power to mine same amount.
Nonce is from computer programming language something.
Emission curve is a refference to block reward for miners. Bitcoin started from 50 bitcoin as block reward and gets halved each 4 years. You can calculate emission by that up to limit of 21 000 000 bitcoins.
Algorithms are also from computer programming term.

Much appreciated

thank you

[deepceleron]

My signature site has what I feel is just the right amount of information to get started in understanding Bitcoin.

There are Bitcoin topics that can go far beyond most people's understanding or desire to learn, such as when we start talking about Merkle trees, digital signature algorithms, hexadecimal math, or subjects that require college-level statistics.

If you have a particular topic you would like to investigate further, you can start at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Category:Technical

[Lauda]

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Please do not listen to that guy. I'm not sure why people respond with completely wrong or half-baked knowledge. If you are not sure about a certain subject, then do not respond (@Velkro).
Difficulty: In it's essence, difficulty is a representation of the target. It's a number used to show 'how difficult' it is to find a hash below a given target. Valid blocks must have a hash below it. The smaller the target the bigger the difficulty and vice versa. It is calculated with the following formula:"difficulty = difficulty_1_target / current_target". [1]
Nonce: Is a value (32 bit) which gets set in order for a hash to have a certain number of leading zeroes. It is believed that it is infeasible to predict what combination will result in the right hash, therefore the nonce is a number constantly being altered/changed/tried in an attempt to find the right one.[2]
Emission Curve: This is the curve representing the Bitcoins that are being mined, i.e. the 'controlled supply' concept. Take a look at this image to see how the supply curve looks like. [3]
Difficulty target: The usual way of referring to it is just 'Target' (as per Wikipedia). I usually explain this with an analogy. Think of all the potential solutions to a block (both valid and invalid) as a pool. Think of the 'target' as a certain area in the pool that you want to hit with a rock. The smaller the area, the harder it is to hit it (smaller target <--> higher difficulty). [4]
Algorithm:"In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm is a self-contained sequence of actions to be performed. Algorithms perform calculation, data processing, and/or automated reasoning tasks. An algorithm is an effective method that can be expressed within a finite amount of space and time and in a well-defined formal language for calculating a function." - Wikipedia definition [5]
Block reward formula: The block reward starts with 50 BTC and halves every 210000 blocks or ~4 years. You can read about it in the same page as the Emission Curve. [3]
Confirmation: If a TX has a confirmation, it simply means it was included in the blockchain. If a TX has 2 confirmations, that means it was included in 2nd last block. 1000 confirmations means it was included 1000 blocks ago and so on. Due to the probabilistic security nature of Bitcoin, the more TXs you have the more secure the transaction is. Generally it is believe that zero confirmation transactions are insecure. [6]
[1] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Difficulty
[2] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Nonce
[3] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Controlled_supply
[4] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Target
[5] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithm
[6] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Confirmation
[7] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Blocks
You can find all the required reading material easily online. IMO it is best that you do your own research and then come back here to ask for help only if you are confused by something/can't understand it yourself.

[tkredmond]

My signature site has what I feel is just the right amount of information to get started in understanding Bitcoin.

There are Bitcoin topics that can go far beyond most people's understanding or desire to learn, such as when we start talking about Merkle trees, digital signature algorithms, hexadecimal math, or subjects that require college-level statistics.

If you have a particular topic you would like to investigate further, you can start at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Category:Technical

will definitely check it

many thanx

[tkredmond]

-snip-

-snip-

Please do not listen to that guy. I'm not sure why people respond with completely wrong or half-baked knowledge. If you are not sure about a certain subject, then do not respond (@Velkro).
Difficulty: In it's essence, difficulty is a representation of the target. It's a number used to show 'how difficult' it is to find a hash below a given target. Valid blocks must have a hash below it. The smaller the target the bigger the difficulty and vice versa. It is calculated with the following formula:"difficulty = difficulty_1_target / current_target". [1]
Nonce: Is a value (32 bit) which gets set in order for a hash to have a certain number of leading zeroes. It is believed that it is infeasible to predict what combination will result in the right hash, therefore the nonce is a number constantly being altered/changed/tried in an attempt to find the right one.[2]
Emission Curve: This is the curve representing the Bitcoins that are being mined, i.e. the 'controlled supply' concept. Take a look at this image to see how the supply curve looks like. [3]
Difficulty target: The usual way of referring to it is just 'Target' (as per Wikipedia). I usually explain this with an analogy. Think of all the potential solutions to a block (both valid and invalid) as a pool. Think of the 'target' as a certain area in the pool that you want to hit with a rock. The smaller the area, the harder it is to hit it (smaller target <--> higher difficulty). [4]
Algorithm:"In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm is a self-contained sequence of actions to be performed. Algorithms perform calculation, data processing, and/or automated reasoning tasks. An algorithm is an effective method that can be expressed within a finite amount of space and time and in a well-defined formal language for calculating a function." - Wikipedia definition [5]
Block reward formula: The block reward starts with 50 BTC and halves every 210000 blocks or ~4 years. You can read about it in the same page as the Emission Curve. [3]
Confirmation: If a TX has a confirmation, it simply means it was included in the blockchain. If a TX has 2 confirmations, that means it was included in 2nd last block. 1000 confirmations means it was included 1000 blocks ago and so on. Due to the probabilistic security nature of Bitcoin, the more TXs you have the more secure the transaction is. Generally it is believe that zero confirmation transactions are insecure. [6]
[1] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Difficulty
[2] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Nonce
[3] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Controlled_supply
[4] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Target
[5] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithm
[6] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Confirmation
[7] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Blocks
You can find all the required reading material easily online. IMO it is best that you do your own research and then come back here to ask for help only if you are confused by something/can't understand it yourself.

thank you Lauda

will check em all