NXT :: descendant of Bitcoin - Updated Information

[marek3ball]

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Who is able to develop a lightweight NXT tool for Windows and Mac, which sits just in your taskbar/menubar (see picture as an example)?

Installing and running this little tool should be hassle free. You can lookup your account, use main Nxt functions (like sending NXT, messaging), activate/deactivate forging right from the menu and you see some general blockchain stats.

That way, we could promote this little gadget as a simple and lightweight tool which runs smoothly in the background, forging for you (or not) and securing the Nxt network.

http://cdn.osxdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/desktop-utility-osx-lion.jpg
http://cloud.addictivetips.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Window-On-Top.png


(I'm no windows user. Do windows user still have this little apps in the task bar? Or is there a modern equivalent, like a gadget on the desktop?)

Since this is so OS-special, maybe two different developers for Windows and Mac. Come on, guys. Raise your hand for this project!

Here is a really bad mock up (I'm no developer). Do you get the idea, my Nxters? Wouldn't you (and others) love this tool which would actively secure the Nxt network? Lightweight, unobtrusive. Like the dropbox app.

Like the dropbox app ... simply DropCoin app

It would be great to have this in wesleyh's client.

[1713480965]

1713480965

[ChuckOne]

Here is a really bad mock up (I'm no developer). Do you get the idea, my Nxters? Wouldn't you (and others) love this tool which would actively secure the Nxt network? Lightweight, unobtrusive. Like the dropbox app.

+1440

[starik69]

You need to set nxt.uiServerHost=0.0.0.0 , by default it is 127.0.0.1 so localhost only.

Strange, works on one node, but not on another.
What about my previous question?
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=345619.msg5335425#msg5335425

[Jerical13]

Not really. Whoever created the currency would have control over its availability. Kind of like You are the FED. Who cares if no one mines. All of the increased value would benefit whoever created the coin. If you had a market or demand. There is more profit in creating a market than mining coins.

I thought the same. Was about writing a PM to CfB if it is possible to create an asset without a private key so that ONLY AT could handle the assets.

Right!!! Any coin that YOU create would cost You the fees of creating it on the AE. Any increase in value would be Yours. You control its availability and there by its value. If You can create a demand. You are probably not going to be successful in doing this by Yourself so You would need a network or a body to help create demand, but you don't need a network of miners. Mining is overrated.

[BrianNowhere]

IMO, forging is fine. In the future, there will be supernodes (service providers) that are basically be high-bandwidth pools people can lend their stake to. This won't be a problem of centralization, because NXT is resistant even against 90% attacks. So unless 1 single pool gets that much forging power, we will be fine. These high-bandwidth pools can support 1000+ TPS easily.

- agree.

I disagree. Many nodes are important to support the network. It the 'decentralized' part. Few supernodes can easily be shutdown.

This might be a stupid idea, but what if part of all transaction fees went to a huge stockpile somewhere that was given out once a month randomly to someone who is forging. Then the incentive to run an open client would be the chance to win the 'Nxt lottery' that month. I know I'd be hard pressed to shut down my client and throw away my 'lottery ticket'.

Err, am I not sure I completely understand that incentive architecture. Could you rephrase it?

Basically, every time there's a transaction in the network, a fraction of the fee would be sent to a designated NXT account. If there's a lot of transactions this would add up to a nice amount over 30 days or so. Basically this would be awarded like a lottery every month to a random Nxter who ran an open client that month. The question is whether there's any way to verify if someone had been forging during the time period to be eligible. Maybe the reward would go out on a random day/time so that no one would know when it's coming and therefore be motivated to always be running an open client.

I'm just trying to think of ways to motivate people to forge when there's not much incentive to do so if you don't have a lot of stake.
This system would make forging akin to owning a lottery ticket. The odds would be somewhat low to win, but reward high enough to encourage participitation.

Interesting. Let's develop that further.

How could nodes agree on which node has won the lottery?

If that could be solved, the lottery ticket should depend on how long a specific node was online. Here arises the question 'how can other nodes be sure that a specific node has been online this month?'

That question is a bit above my pay grade as I don't know if or how you can verify participation. If not, I would just set it up to pick a random user and then send the reward out by perhaps sending them a block. (also don't know if it's possible to promote someone to the head of the line like that) Then,  If they are not there to generate the block then a new random user is chosen. This repeats til someone generates the block and gets the reward.  The winning account could be announced daily on nxtcrypo.org or something.  In this case it would be important for the time this happens to be totally random. If you are not "home" when the prize comes you are S.O.L.  Many people would then go to insane lengths to ensure their client is always open and running. I know that if I was going to reboot my system I'd make sure I opened my NXT on another computer before i did.

[Eadeqa]

If that could be solved, the lottery ticket should depend on how long a specific node was online. Here arises the question 'how can other nodes be sure that a specific node has been online this month?'

Instead of 30 days, lets make this time shorter. 24 hours?.12 hours? 6 hours? In that case, you don't have to keep track if the node awarded lottery has been running for 30 days. Just award it randomly to a node that is running at the time the award is given. The winner can be picked totally randomly.  

This will entice some people to keep NRS online, just to have a random chance at winning every few hours.

[mthcl]

Did I get it correctly? If yes, what happens then (assuming 1 wants to continue with its bad behavior)?

I think you've got it correctly - the reason that 1 can't continue this behavior successfully depends upon his control of the future blocks (which he can't actually *control by himself* due the random nature of crypto hashes).

So the *evil block forger* actually needs *evil friends* to help him. If he has enough friends then he can win but the actual probability of this is why we need a math guy.

OK, it's good that I'm starting to understand something. Sorry for being soooo slow, but that's on purpose   It's better to clear any misunderstanding on an early stage.

To proceed, I need to understand:

1. How the "weight" variable is actually computed?

2. In particular, for what reason the weights on a "bad" branch are supposed to be much smaller than on the main one?

3. Assume that a node sees at least one neighbor with a different version of the blockchain (from the blockchain that our node has). How does it decide, which is the "correct" one?


Then, do I understand correctly, that the main object of interest is the probability distribution of the length of the "bad" branch? That is, we should be able to issue statements like "given that the bad guy has X% of all NXT, he can grow a bad branch of length at least 10 with probability at most 0.00000000003", right?


On the side note, there is probably also a question about penalizing "suspicious" accounts. Because if the rules are too strict, then inevitably your would penalize some good guys too, and so maybe an attacker can invent a strategy to break the network because too many nodes are penalized. Is this a possible issue?

[Jean-Luc]

Still don't understand. In versions <0.8.0 when i announce a public address but set sharing to false other node will connect to me only after my node first connects to it. In 0.8.0 such logic of behavior is impossible. Is this true?  

Yes, this is true. You don't have control over which nodes you connect to, so why would you need such behavior? It would only make sense if you can define a whitelist of nodes to connect to, but currently you can't do that. Your node will keep trying to connect to whatever list of peers it receives from the others, and telling them your public address itself, how is that different from allowing the peers to share it amongst themselves too?

You are wrong, i can define a whitelist of nodes to connect to by firewall rules.

Why don't just set the shareMyAddress to false then? Your node will function fine with incoming connections completely disabled.

I don't want to complicate the configuration by adding yet another boolean parameter whether to start the peer server or not, in addition to shareMyAddress.

Edit. and btw, what are nxt.pushThreshold and nxt.pullThreshold then for?

The thresholds only apply for outgoing connections from your node. For rejecting incoming ones, only blacklisting works.

[mthcl]

I'm so glad to see a real math person on the case. I just tipped you 10 Nxt. Please stick around to help sort though all this madness.

Thank you!

And it's not madness, I'm starting to find it very interesting  

[BrianNowhere]

If that could be solved, the lottery ticket should depend on how long a specific node was online. Here arises the question 'how can other nodes be sure that a specific node has been online this month?'

Instead of 30 days, lets make this time shorter. 24 hours?.12 hours? 6 hours? In that case, you don't have to keep track if the node awarded lottery has been running for 30 days. Just award it randomly to a node that is running at the time the award is given. The winner can be picked totally randomly.  

This will entice some people to keep NRS online, just to have a random chance at winning every few hours.

This would work too. It's kind of a weird solution I know.

[ChuckOne]

If that could be solved, the lottery ticket should depend on how long a specific node was online. Here arises the question 'how can other nodes be sure that a specific node has been online this month?'

Instead of 30 days, lets make this time shorter. 24 hours?.12 hours? 6 hours? In that case, you don't have to keep track if the node awarded lottery has been running for 30 days. Just award it randomly to a node that is running at the time the award is given. The winner can be picked totally randomly.  

This will entice some people to keep NRS online, just to have a random chance at winning every few hours.

Legit. Could work for many small shareholders. Not sure if big players could outplay the smaller ones but could work for broad adoption with millions of smartphone users.

[ChuckOne]

First issue still remains: how do nodes agree on the winner?

EDIT: Still think that having a verification of participation is needed. Just random lottery will not lead to security.

[jl777]

I will be coming out with "coins" that are actually NXT AE assets that can be mined by CPU. Every miner will need to be running a NXT node. If there is any level of market for such a coin the miners will start mining by the droves. Since the market for it is AE, we can always jump start the market by subsidizing the prices during the early days in order to ensure enough network capacity

This is another great service on top of NXT (besides the NXTopia) that stimulates the AE. +1

I like this very much.
it allows us to keep the "miners" on board and still helps secure the network without changing the core mechanics.

Elegant!

Would mining be needed for coins created on the exchange? I thought you could just "create" assets.  

It would have no value if there were a billion available to be sold, so nobody would mine that. I have to make the Asset scarce so that it behaves like PoW coin inventory, well I dont like all pre-mine, etc. so the good news is that we can define  how the mining works. Just need some tech to enforce the rules. If you think about it, even bitcoin can one day say, hey we removed the cap and now there can be 21 billion of them. There is nothing that prevents that other than the social contract, and also the fact that it would instantly destroy all credibility makes it an extremely illogical and unlikely event. As long as we can create the same dynamic with NXTcoins, it will work like other PoW coins.

James

Not really. Whoever created the currency would have control over its availability. Kind of like You are the FED. Who cares if no one mines. All of the increased value would benefit whoever created the coin. If you had a market or demand. There is more profit in creating a market than mining coins.

Really. As the creator of the currency, I can say that I would only sell any coins that I mined or purchased and that the coins that have been created by issuing, but not yet mined are off limits. I can enforce this with peer nodes verifying the balance 24/7. Any violation of this would destroy the coin. It could also be possible to use AT savings account to release the coins in a predictable and controlled fashion. That would reduce the risk to just the current batch that is being released could be misappropriated.

I want to recreate all the important characteristic of minable coins and have it exist on top of NXT. This will totally solve any network capacity issues as the miners have some pretty powerful rigs. It also allows miners to become part of the NXT economy, which I know will be a lot better than XYZ coin

James

P.S. Testnet got a block! NEW block.(5965269559946416574) vs lastblock.(4203933645799564239)

[starik69]

Still don't understand. In versions <0.8.0 when i announce a public address but set sharing to false other node will connect to me only after my node first connects to it. In 0.8.0 such logic of behavior is impossible. Is this true?  

Yes, this is true. You don't have control over which nodes you connect to, so why would you need such behavior? It would only make sense if you can define a whitelist of nodes to connect to, but currently you can't do that. Your node will keep trying to connect to whatever list of peers it receives from the others, and telling them your public address itself, how is that different from allowing the peers to share it amongst themselves too?

You are wrong, i can define a whitelist of nodes to connect to by firewall rules.

Why don't just set the shareMyAddress to false then? Your node will function fine with incoming connections completely disabled.

I don't want to complicate the configuration by adding yet another boolean parameter whether to start the peer server or not, in addition to shareMyAddress.

What if i want incoming connections only from nodes with some Hallmark threshold? If i first connect to them and they would not share my address - then only them could connect to me?

Edit. and btw, what are nxt.pushThreshold and nxt.pullThreshold then for?

The thresholds only apply for outgoing connections from your node. For rejecting incoming ones, only blacklisting works.

So this "You don't have control over which nodes you connect to" is wrong?

[BrianNowhere]

I will be coming out with "coins" that are actually NXT AE assets that can be mined by CPU. Every miner will need to be running a NXT node. If there is any level of market for such a coin the miners will start mining by the droves. Since the market for it is AE, we can always jump start the market by subsidizing the prices during the early days in order to ensure enough network capacity

This is another great service on top of NXT (besides the NXTopia) that stimulates the AE. +1

I like this very much.
it allows us to keep the "miners" on board and still helps secure the network without changing the core mechanics.

Elegant!

Would mining be needed for coins created on the exchange? I thought you could just "create" assets.  

It would have no value if there were a billion available to be sold, so nobody would mine that. I have to make the Asset scarce so that it behaves like PoW coin inventory, well I dont like all pre-mine, etc. so the good news is that we can define  how the mining works. Just need some tech to enforce the rules. If you think about it, even bitcoin can one day say, hey we removed the cap and now there can be 21 billion of them. There is nothing that prevents that other than the social contract, and also the fact that it would instantly destroy all credibility makes it an extremely illogical and unlikely event. As long as we can create the same dynamic with NXTcoins, it will work like other PoW coins.

James

Not really. Whoever created the currency would have control over its availability. Kind of like You are the FED. Who cares if no one mines. All of the increased value would benefit whoever created the coin. If you had a market or demand. There is more profit in creating a market than mining coins.

Really. As the creator of the currency, I can say that I would only sell any coins that I mined or purchased and that the coins that have been created by issuing, but not yet mined are off limits. I can enforce this with peer nodes verifying the balance 24/7. Any violation of this would destroy the coin. It could also be possible to use AT savings account to release the coins in a predictable and controlled fashion. That would reduce the risk to just the current batch that is being released could be misappropriated.

I want to recreate all the important characteristic of minable coins and have it exist on top of NXT. This will totally solve any network capacity issues as the miners have some pretty powerful rigs. It also allows miners to become part of the NXT economy, which I know will be a lot better than XYZ coin

James

P.S. Testnet got a block! NEW block.(5965269559946416574) vs lastblock.(4203933645799564239)

One of the things I like about NXT is that it has the potential to make mining obsolete. This whole operation even being needed seems like a waving of the white flag by POS, admitting that the network can't be secured without mining.

I'm old enough to remember going though an energy crisis. If that ever happens again a lot of people are going to be giving the stink eye to the alternative coin mining community. I mean why did we even invent all those pig-tail looking light-bulbs if this is how we're going to squander electricity?

[l8orre]

I've restarted the testnet. We have to wait for the next block to start sending testcoins.

Did you send me 100k TestNxt to this address : 4940924250576724047

whit this command  https://holms.cloudapp.net:6875/nxt?requestType=getBalance&account=4940924250576724047

i see 0 TestNxt ... 


i have to wait the next block ?

Yes, we all have to wait when someone forges a block.

Hey CfB - please send me some testNxt later - I need to sign off now.

1738404304940813414

Cheers!

[landomata]

Really. As the creator of the currency, I can say that I would only sell any coins that I mined or purchased and that the coins that have been created by issuing, but not yet mined are off limits. I can enforce this with peer nodes verifying the balance 24/7. Any violation of this would destroy the coin. It could also be possible to use AT savings account to release the coins in a predictable and controlled fashion. That would reduce the risk to just the current batch that is being released could be misappropriated.

I think we should lend more energy and thought to this line of reasoning as it really does solve the problem of securing the network while also creating a new market at the same time.

And even if the coin fails we can always create another and another and another similar coin until we get it right.

[ChuckOne]

One of the things I like about NXT is that it has the potential to make mining obsolete. This whole operation even being needed seems like a waving of the white flag by POS, admitting that the network can't be secured without mining.

I think the point is that we do not want bloat the space of node just for the sake of it. Each node should contribute to the stability to the network. And to prove that, it simply has to do some sort of work.

Just having zombie nodes contributing nothing is not enough.

I'm old enough to remember going though an energy crisis. If that ever happens again a lot of people are going to be giving the stink eye to the alternative coin mining community. I mean why did we even invent all those pig-tail looking light-bulbs if this is how we're going to squander electricity?

+1

[chanc3r]

Would it help to add some more network intelligence to NXT so it became more self-organising, so the nodes were more aware that they were part of a network and integrating into that network properly makes it stronger, rather than just being, well, nodes with some connections...

At the moment the network organisation of NXT is a mystery, I don't know if nodes look for nearest nodes, and optimum number of connections based on available bandwidth, or just grab hold of any node they happen to see.

Self optimising isn't complex - it just requires each node to be a 'good neighbour' - although in our network you need to re-define the location attributes which can be ip-addr, latency etc

Some of this I can see NXT nodes do from their behaviour, but not all of it, maybe I don't know the mechanics well enough and more is going on.

Anyway I don't know if its of interest but I thought I would add it to the mix, translating what I know of the mobile world this is what self-organising characteristics would look like;

Self Configuring means new nodes shall automatically be configured and integrated into the network. This means both connectivity establishment, and download of configuration parameters. When a new node is introduced into the network and powered on, it gets immediately recognized and registered by the network. The neighboring nodes (self optimising) would then automatically adjust their technical parameters in order to balance the required coverage and capacity, and, in the same time, avoid unnecessary conflict.

Self Optimising means each node adjusts its parameters to ensure it fits in with the its immediate network neighbourhood, based on observation of neighbouring nodes and its own traffic, for example in periods of over capacity the nodes could all configure a shared sleep time to take it in turns conserving energy when there is not enough work to justify the number that are in existence.

Self Healing means when one or more nodes in the network become inoperative, failure or ddos, self-healing mechanisms aim at reducing the impacts from the failure, for example by adjusting parameters and algorithms in adjacent nodes so that other nodes can support the users that were supported by the failing node.

[ChuckOne]

If that could be solved, the lottery ticket should depend on how long a specific node was online. Here arises the question 'how can other nodes be sure that a specific node has been online this month?'

Instead of 30 days, lets make this time shorter. 24 hours?.12 hours? 6 hours? In that case, you don't have to keep track if the node awarded lottery has been running for 30 days. Just award it randomly to a node that is running at the time the award is given. The winner can be picked totally randomly.  

This will entice some people to keep NRS online, just to have a random chance at winning every few hours.

Legit. Could work for many small shareholders. Not sure if big players could outplay the smaller ones but could work for broad adoption with millions of smartphone users.

it sounds like another robin hood plan

It certainly does.