[ALPHA.masterpool.eu] Merged Mining Test Pool - TESTNET - BTC & NMC

[nodemaster]

You may already have heard about merged mining (http://dot-bit.org/Merged_Mining). In short you can mine at one pool and will generate bitcoins, namecoins and in future other blockchains at once. This is not about splitting your hashrate between several blockchains. For example if you mine with 1 Ghash/s at a common BTC pool. You'll mine BTC and NMC with 1Ghash/s each at a merged mining enabled pool. This has already been discussed at this forum: http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=29074.0

Merged Mining however is in testing stage. For that reason I deployed a test pool. It features the current webinterface of the MasterPool namecoin pool and is running on testnet. We already did some testing over at the namecoin forum (find the thread here: http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=262). We want as much people as possible to participate in testing before merged mining is released. Thus if you are interested in testing your mining proxy or any miner setup with merged mining or want to get an idea how merged mining feels you are welcome to join the pool. Please post any issues or successfully mining setups in either of the threads or in the namecoin wiki (http://dot-bit.org/Merged_Mining).

https://alpha.masterpool.eu

WARNING! The only purpose of this alpha pool is to test merged mining. This pool is in ALPHA status. This means your can test, but you get no guaranteed payouts (we are running on testnet anyway, thus the revenues are not usable on standard bitcoin or namecoin net). Furthermore most of the mined coins will be invalid/orphaned even on testnet. This is only a VPS. Thus please don't hammer it and don't expect it to be fixed within minutes if it crashes!
Happy mining!

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[nodemaster]

I'll try my best to synchronize information between BTC and NMC forum, but I guess the most current information are available on NMC forum: http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=262.

Current Status:

• We are running on vinceds RC3
• BTC Testnet works so far and are being verified ATM
• NMC Testnet are not generated as POW is rejected by the namecoin blockchain below block 24k

However from the logfiles we can reconstruct if a NMC block would have been created above block 24k. ATM we are discussing an easy possibility to simulate a NMC testnet above block 24k in order to test that extensively.

There are conflicting reports about phoenix miner 1.50 working or not. If you like test it as well and give feedback. Find a list of already tested miners here: http://dot-bit.org/Merged_Mining#Tested_miners

[shaun5000]

I am running my whole hash farm on your test server with GUI miner and so far no problems. I would like to know if this kind of stress test is helpful in moving this process along?

[nodemaster]

I am running my whole hash farm on your test server with GUI miner and so far no problems. I would like to know if this kind of stress test is helpful in moving this process along?

Yes thank you very much. This is much appreciated. I'd like to generate at least 120 "fresh" blocks (with merged mining enabled). After that we get the first namecoins and can even test transactions. The more hashrate we have for testing the earlier we break even with testing. ATM we have about 50 percent of the blocks needed in order to get a block payed out.

Edit: Just realized this is the Bitcoin Forum. I'd like to announce, that we are now running on a patched namecoin version which includes proof of work in to the blockchain. As this is incompatible with the old testnet blockchain we splitted the "original" namecoin blockchain now having a separate "test testnet blockchain"   However to get namecoins payed out after the first block is confirmed you need a slightly modified namecoind:

https://github.com/nodemaster/namecoin

You might also want to check the alpha pool thread on namecoin forum: http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1565#p1565 as well as the dev thread: http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=269

[nodemaster]

The pool has verified its first block. I resetted the balance of all users and thus dispossessed everybody From now on you should be able to withdraw namecoins. But remember, you have to use a modified client in order to receive those merged mining namecoins! (see above).

Please try to withdraw namecoins and transfer them for testing. If you don't have any use for them after testing it would be nice if you transfer them back to the pool. This will make it possible to have other users test transactions as well:

NMC: moVDDfgu7AXaTS35BWTkgy1Pkcu9WxTaQw

If you need a few merged mining namecoins just let me know your NMC address. I'll send you a few for testing.

[nodemaster]

I just deployed RC5 on alpha. Furthermore I deployed latest MasterPool Frontend. In the dashboard you can now find the new Scheduled Payout feature. This feature (if enabled and given you provided an address for each blockchain) will do automatic payouts every hour. Thus you can fire and forget your miners and test payouts very easily. All payouts (BTC and NMC) should work now (though they are not guaranteed) if you have at least a RC5 namecoind.

Please read the warning at: https://alpha.masterpool.eu/

[nodemaster]

A bit Off Topic, but I want to position this as public a possible:

I'm neither the developer, nor the inventor of Merged Mining.

I'm just a pool operator, who is eager to get MM into production state. I gathered information about MM at dot-bit wiki: http://dot-bit.org/MergedMining and implemented the first public merged mining pool. But nothing more.

Credits for Merged Mining go to:

• Mike Hearn (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2700) for the technical fundamentals: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Alternative_Chains
• vinced (http://dot-bit.org/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=73) who implemented MM

I don't know where this rumours started and I truly hope, that I didn't say or write anything that led to the conclusion I might be the inventor of Merged Mining. But as I got two inquiries about merged mining today, suggesting I'm the inventor, I thought it'll be better to clearify this before rumours spread. I'm still answering questions about merged mining (as far as I'm able to do so) and compile information into the wiki article, but please give credits to the persons who deserve it!

[nodemaster]

it seems we finally agreed on a block for merged mining over at the NMC Forum. The block number for merged mining will be 19,200 (Namecoin block) which is less than 400 blocks away. At the current speed we will hit block 19200 at about mid september. I deployed the current NMC merged mining namecoind and bitcoind. But we are still running on testnet. However production MasterPool (https://www.masterpool.eu/merged) has already deployed the same versions and is running on NMC blockchain. With block 19200 the pool will automatically start mining BTC as well.

So this might be my last post on this thread. I want to thank all testers and want to invite you to join us on https://www.masterpool.eu/. However as soon as we have precompiled merged mining binaries of namecoind available I'll post a new thread for the production server. The alpha testserver will vanish sometime after merged mining startet. Thus if you want your Testnet BTC and/or NMC please withdraw them. All the other testnet coins will be transfered to testnet faucets.

[DavinciJ15]

it seems we finally agreed on a block for merged mining over at the NMC Forum. The block number for merged mining will be 19,200 (Namecoin block) which is less than 400 blocks away. At the current speed we will hit block 19200 at about mid september. I deployed the current NMC merged mining namecoind and bitcoind. But we are still running on testnet. However production MasterPool (https://www.masterpool.eu/merged) has already deployed the same versions and is running on NMC blockchain. With block 19200 the pool will automatically start mining BTC as well.

So this might be my last post on this thread. I want to thank all testers and want to invite you to join us on https://www.masterpool.eu/. However as soon as we have precompiled merged mining binaries of namecoind available I'll post a new thread for the production server. The alpha testserver will vanish sometime after merged mining startet. Thus if you want your Testnet BTC and/or NMC please withdraw them. All the other testnet coins will be transfered to testnet faucets.

Where do I find the patch for bitcoind?  The only patch I found patched wxWidgets and looking at the source code of /merged-mine-proxy It requires a bigger change than library code changes.

[DavinciJ15]

Hi can you please help me find the source code to bitcoind 0.3.24.60?


Thanks

Davinci

[xzion]

Hi nodemaster, any idea when we can expect to see windows binaries of the new client?

EDIT: cgminer running great with masterpool, nice low stales.