I thought I would do the super secure thing and make a brainwallet!
Brainwallets are really not that secure, especially if you thought of the password yourself (versus letting a computer generate one for you).
So I made the brainwallet with a passphrase, and sent all my bitcoins there. I then wrote down my passphrase and off I went.
A few days later I went to check my wallet and I couldn't get the right private key. I was so mad, and I tried a few other people but nobody was able to help me get my coins back.
Anyway, now that BTC has hit 10k, I am really hoping I can get my hands on my wallet. I found some older threads about using some Ruby program or bitcoind or something to find your wallet, but I am a complete programming noob, and have no idea where to begin. Could anyone possibly help me out?
And yes, I know I am stupid for using a brainwallet and I deserve for my coins to be lost, but it was a long time ago and I had no idea what I was really doing.
There is no standard for generating brainwallets, so it entirely depends upon how you created the brainwallet in the first place. What website or software did you use? How much of the password do you remember? Do you know potential candidates for the password? Was the brainwallet salted? If so, what was the salt?
There are a lot of things that you need to know that you may not know before you can even start trying to guess the password, and if you don't know or don't remember those things, then you probably will not be able to get your coins.