NXT :: descendant of Bitcoin - Updated Information

[redsn0w]

Hey people , how are you ??

[CIYAM]

Hey people , how are you ??

The bar looks pretty empty - at least you won't have to wait to get a drink.

Want to play a game of pool?

[redsn0w]

Hey people , how are you ??

The bar looks pretty empty - at least you won't have to wait to get a drink.

Want to play a game of pool?

Lol  , why not ?

[msin]

Hey people , how are you ??

The bar looks pretty empty - at least you won't have to wait to get a drink.

Want to play a game of pool?

Lol  , why not ?

I'll take winner.

[ShroomsKit_Disgrace]

CIYAM, would you contribute only here with your valuable posts? or are we meeting in the "new" forum too?

Regards! 

[CIYAM]

CIYAM, would you contribute only here with your valuable posts? or are we meeting in the "new" forum too?

I have made a few posts tonight on the new forum (whether they are of any *value* or not is something for others to decide).

BTW - I dislike 9-ball and much prefer 8-ball with the "straight pool" method of *calling* (i.e. ball and pocket but not *how*) - I ran a pool competition in Beijing for over 2 years (that was one of the most popular).

The only problem I found with the "straight pool" calling approach is what is known as "dead-lock" (if the black is covered by the opponents ball in a pocket).

It only happened though *once* in those two plus years (so not such a big problem IMO).

[gs02xzz]

CIYAM, would you contribute only here with your valuable posts? or are we meeting in the "new" forum too?

I have made a few posts tonight on the new forum (whether they are of any *value* or not is something for others to decide).

BTW - I dislike 9-ball and much prefer 8-ball with the "straight pool" method of *calling* (i.e. ball and pocket but not *how*) - I ran a pool competition in Beijing for over 2 years (that was one of the most popular).

Any update on the AT project? Have you got the help from the Java programmers?

[CIYAM]

Any update on the AT project? Have you got the help from the Java programmers?

Not since last night - but my understanding is that "my prototype" is at least 50% translated into Java (maybe more).

[mthcl]

Again on this "true randomization" issue. In general, what amount of randomization is desirable, i.e., how often should it happen? If not very often (e.g., several times a day), then the real world will take care of this (because nodes go online and offline, money are transferred, etc.).

I agree. I wrote the following to CfB:

I do not think that is possible anymore. Preparing means you need to know 1440 blocks in advance which accounts you need. So, you need to build up the a whole forging graph of size http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=28000%5E1440 (28000 accounts, 1440 blocks for effectiveBalance) [to get sure you cover all cases]. The leaves of that graph represent the entry points for the attacker's accounts. Then the attacker needs to create accounts at the right time to forge the next N blocks. That is like calculating the private key out of your public key.

If this is not enough, then the following procedure is possible. First X accounts (w.r.t. the inverse weights) choose some "random" numbers locally, and publish their hashes. X is supposed to be large enough so that the bad guy would never control exactly all of them. Then, they publish numbers themselves; if the published number does not correspond to the hash or is not published at all, then the corresponding account is heavily penalized. If that happens for at least one account, the whole procedure is invalidated (and we wait for the next try)..

The problem here still is: who belongs to X if one of X is offline and who decides that? It is the very same consensus finding problem that block generation tries to solve.

Well, with our forging procedure we obtain a consensus about who are the best X account w.r.t. the inverse weights, right (and the network then delegates to the best of the best the right to create the next block)? Then we just ask those best accounts to provide a random number for us. The idea is that if there is at least one "honest" guy among them, then this random number will be "truly random", even if all the others try to cheat.

[gs02xzz]

CIYAM, would you contribute only here with your valuable posts? or are we meeting in the "new" forum too?

I have made a few posts tonight on the new forum (whether they are of any *value* or not is something for others to decide).

BTW - I dislike 9-ball and much prefer 8-ball with the "straight pool" method of *calling* (i.e. ball and pocket but not *how*) - I ran a pool competition in Beijing for over 2 years (that was one of the most popular).

The only problem I found with the "straight pool" calling approach is what is known as "dead-lock" (if the black is covered by the opponents ball in a pocket).

It only happened though *once* in those two plus years (so not such a big problem IMO).

You still live in Beijing? How do you like there? Any comments on the air pollution there?

[CIYAM]

You still live in Beijing? How do you like there? Any comments on the air pollution there?

I left Beijing and now live in the south of China - the air pollution was a major reason for leaving (and you might have seen the reports of how bad it has been there recently - so I think I left at the right time).

[ChuckOne]

emule is anyone squatting your ID on the new forums?  wed love to have to continue your antics over there and if you need me to delete the account so you can recreate it let me know

+1

[ChuckOne]

Again on this "true randomization" issue. In general, what amount of randomization is desirable, i.e., how often should it happen? If not very often (e.g., several times a day), then the real world will take care of this (because nodes go online and offline, money are transferred, etc.).

I agree. I wrote the following to CfB:

I do not think that is possible anymore. Preparing means you need to know 1440 blocks in advance which accounts you need. So, you need to build up the a whole forging graph of size http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=28000%5E1440 (28000 accounts, 1440 blocks for effectiveBalance) [to get sure you cover all cases]. The leaves of that graph represent the entry points for the attacker's accounts. Then the attacker needs to create accounts at the right time to forge the next N blocks. That is like calculating the private key out of your public key.

If this is not enough, then the following procedure is possible. First X accounts (w.r.t. the inverse weights) choose some "random" numbers locally, and publish their hashes. X is supposed to be large enough so that the bad guy would never control exactly all of them. Then, they publish numbers themselves; if the published number does not correspond to the hash or is not published at all, then the corresponding account is heavily penalized. If that happens for at least one account, the whole procedure is invalidated (and we wait for the next try)..

The problem here still is: who belongs to X if one of X is offline and who decides that? It is the very same consensus finding problem that block generation tries to solve.

Well, with our forging procedure we obtain a consensus about who are the best X account w.r.t. the inverse weights, right (and the network then delegates to the best of the best the right to create the next block)? Then we just ask those best accounts to provide a random number for us. The idea is that if there is at least one "honest" guy among them, then this random number will be "truly random", even if all the others try to cheat.

The problem is not on the side of the forgers. It is on the side of the one that uses the random numbers. Which numbers does he choose? More importantly, which numbers does he omit and which ones does he include in his calculation?

Assume, he finds a way to exclude everything but one number, he can then pre-calculate an account that provide a suitable random number for him in the future. It is the very same problem.

Btw. invalidating the whole procedure would lead to abusing this exit mechanism: a bad guy could pre-calculate an account that yields an error in the procedure.

[paradigmflux]

Please guys, take a few minutes to take a look at hashrate.org
I've really tried my best to make a game changer here.

Too bad I've been working so hard on it I forgot to stock up on NXT ahead of time, lol

Looks COOL dude!

A few points (I know you're still developing)
- There's one picture on the main site that doesn't load: "http://www.nxt.co/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/NXT_300.png".
- Clicking on top tabs gets you to an empty page


(P.S. could you crosspost this to the new forum? You would get a lot more reactions there, I think).

Surprisingly little feedback from there so far. :<

[paradigmflux]

Can you all please start following @NXTPool on Twitter, please?

[salsacz]

NxtMinnow will speak about Nxt in 10 minutes, watch online stream
http://livestream.coinsumm.it/

[mthcl]

Again on this "true randomization" issue. In general, what amount of randomization is desirable, i.e., how often should it happen? If not very often (e.g., several times a day), then the real world will take care of this (because nodes go online and offline, money are transferred, etc.).

I agree. I wrote the following to CfB:

I do not think that is possible anymore. Preparing means you need to know 1440 blocks in advance which accounts you need. So, you need to build up the a whole forging graph of size http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=28000%5E1440 (28000 accounts, 1440 blocks for effectiveBalance) [to get sure you cover all cases]. The leaves of that graph represent the entry points for the attacker's accounts. Then the attacker needs to create accounts at the right time to forge the next N blocks. That is like calculating the private key out of your public key.

If this is not enough, then the following procedure is possible. First X accounts (w.r.t. the inverse weights) choose some "random" numbers locally, and publish their hashes. X is supposed to be large enough so that the bad guy would never control exactly all of them. Then, they publish numbers themselves; if the published number does not correspond to the hash or is not published at all, then the corresponding account is heavily penalized. If that happens for at least one account, the whole procedure is invalidated (and we wait for the next try)..

The problem here still is: who belongs to X if one of X is offline and who decides that? It is the very same consensus finding problem that block generation tries to solve.

Well, with our forging procedure we obtain a consensus about who are the best X account w.r.t. the inverse weights, right (and the network then delegates to the best of the best the right to create the next block)? Then we just ask those best accounts to provide a random number for us. The idea is that if there is at least one "honest" guy among them, then this random number will be "truly random", even if all the others try to cheat.

The problem is not on the side of the forgers. It is on the side of the one that uses the random numbers. Which numbers does he choose? More importantly, which numbers does he omit and which ones does he include in his calculation?

Assume, he finds a way to exclude everything but one number, he can then pre-calculate an account that provide a suitable random number for him in the future. It is the very same problem.

Btw. invalidating the whole procedure would lead to abusing this exit mechanism: a bad guy could pre-calculate an account that yields an error in the procedure.

The random number provided by this procedure is supposed to be known to everyone (say, from time to time we insert it to the blockchain) and used to "break" the determinism.

The random numbers the accounts provide cannot be precalculated, they are just outputs of rand() or smth similar. In principle, there should not be any "errors" in the procedure: the account first publishes the hash, and then (if required) the number itself. The error can only appear if the guy is deliberately cheating; but, in this case, he doesn't get nothing for it: his account is banned, and the procedure is repeated after some time.

I'm writing this now in a more detailed way; will post the new version of the paper by tomorrow.

[wesleyh]

NxtMinnow will speak about Nxt in 10 minutes, watch online stream
http://livestream.coinsumm.it/

is it normal that it only shows a splash screen now? will you post this on nxtforum too?

[salsacz]

yes, it's cofee break now

[Damelon]

http://livestream.coinsumm.it/

NxtMinnow on NOW!