[204 GH/s] yourbtc.net closing it's doors on 2011-12-08

[Meni Rosenfeld]

I may sound like idiotic but? Is pure PPS stil best for slow miners with slow hashrates (under 100mhash). There are some PPS pools with 0%fee and they share full 50BTC/shares. So that should be best option? Right? Or do we get more advantage with DGM in long run? Im not sure if i understadn even single thing about DGM?

0% fee PPS (and I'm talking about real PPS, not fakes) would have been best, but in fact it's too good to be true - in pools that have this this is a promotional offer that can't be sustained over the long run. Many PPS operators don't completely understand the risks involved and their pool is at risk of bankruptcy or switching to a safer method. But if a pool does manage to offer PPS with low fees it's better than any other method with the same fees.

But it doesn't matter too much. 100 MH/s is less than what some people have but it's high enough that you don't have to worry about share-based variance. DGM, PPLNS etc. will be perfectly fine and I think this pool is better than currently existing PPS offers. Larger pools have an advantage though.

You don't really need to understand the specifics of DGM. There are good methods and bad methods, and all good methods (such as DGM) will give you pretty much the same payout over the long run.

[urstroyer]

Greetings,

we are working on merged mining as well. Until we get a working solution, i'am donating 15 BTC to our miners to make sure you won't have a disadvantage.

In order to gain full advantage of merged mining we will gather all nmc and trade them for you into btc as a service.
Payout will happen in form of our so called Loyality Bonus. This is how it works:

Everytime the pool gains additional income like transaction fees from solved blocks or merged mining earnings it will be gathered in our Loyality Bonus pool balance.

• We gather all additional earnings in a Loyality Bonus pool balance.
• At the end of every month, the whole pool balance is payed to the pool and we start at zero pool balance again.
• Payout is calculated propotional on monthly shares:
  [your payout] = [Loyality Bonus pool balance] / [all monthly valid shares] * [your monthly valid shares]

I hope you like it!

Cheers,

Chris

[Meni Rosenfeld]

In order to gain full advantage of merged mining we will gather all nmc and trade them for you into btc as a service.

This part I like...

[your payout] = [Loyality Bonus pool balance] / [all monthly valid shares] * [your monthly valid shares][/li][/list]

This part I don't like. What's the point using a hopping-proof method and then adding a hoppable feature?

The method handles transaction fees as is as long as you determine B correctly. It needs to be the total block reward corresponding to a share's getwork.

You can add namecoins by having separate Bitcoin Score and Namecoin Score, where the namecoin reward according to the method is converted to bitcoins before entering the confirmed balance.

[urstroyer]

[your payout] = [Loyality Bonus pool balance] / [all monthly valid shares] * [your monthly valid shares][/li][/list]

This part I don't like. What's the point using a hopping-proof method and then adding a hoppable feature?

The method handles transaction fees as is as long as you determine B correctly. It needs to be the total block reward corresponding to a share's getwork.

You can add namecoins by having separate Bitcoin Score and Namecoin Score, where the namecoin reward according to the method is converted to bitcoins before entering the confirmed balance.

Agreed, thats a quick and dirty offer to stay competitive. Will work on this, as soon mm is enabled in order to offer a fair and transparent longterm solution.

[teukon]

Hi,

I've recently run into difficulties with my main pool and am in the market for a new one (I have 720 MH/s).  I thought I'd start here (for the DGM of course).

I was also thrown by the line

[your payout] = [Loyality Bonus pool balance] / [all monthly valid shares] * [your monthly valid shares]

and although not as bad as the proportional reward system (due to the fixed round length of one month) it is definitely rather ugly.  I'm glad to see that this issue has already been raised.

I have many thoughts and questions but I'll keep them to myself for now, read around a bit more, and see how things go.

[urstroyer]

The method handles transaction fees as is as long as you determine B correctly. It needs to be the total block reward corresponding to a share's getwork.

Did some homework after Meni's feedback, in order to determine B (block reward + transaction fees) correctly when a share was submitted:

bitcoind version 0.5 will get a "getmemorypool" call, which is capable to get the btc amount of transaction fees, if the current network block would be solved at that moment.

So the distribution of transaction fees will be included into DGM on yourbtc.net as soon as it's technically possible.

[teukon]

I'm not currently able to connect to the pool (yourbtc.net:8999, s15747378.onlinehome-server.info:8999) or the site (either http or https), nor do I get a response when pinging yourbtc.net.  Any idea on the cause?  Is this a common problem?

[urstroyer]

I'm not currently able to connect to the pool (yourbtc.net:8999, s15747378.onlinehome-server.info:8999) or the site (either http or https), nor do I get a response when pinging yourbtc.net.  Any idea on the cause?  Is this a common problem?

Hi teukon,

sounds like a routing problem. Server and all services are up and running.

Could you try to connect your miner to 87.106.84.25:8999 as a workaround?

If you are on irc you find me on #yourbtc / irc.freenode.net to figure this out.

Best regards,

Chris

[teukon]

I'm not currently able to connect to the pool (yourbtc.net:8999, s15747378.onlinehome-server.info:8999) or the site (either http or https), nor do I get a response when pinging yourbtc.net.  Any idea on the cause?  Is this a common problem?

Hi teukon,

sounds like a routing problem. Server and all services are up and running.

Could you try to connect your miner to 87.106.84.25:8999 as a workaround?

If you are on irc you find me on #yourbtc / irc.freenode.net to figure this out.

Best regards,

Chris

No joy.  Substituting 87.106.84.25 for yourbtc.net make no difference to site access, pool access, or ping.  Everything looks dead.  I'm fully able to use pretty much any other site.  Furthermore, the site and pool were working fine for me when I signed up and I got in about 12 hours of good mining.

I'm afraid I'm not on irc.

Thanks for the help.

EDIT: http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/yourbtc.net says the site is fine.  Also, I'm able to ssh into a machine with a different ip address and ping yourbtc.net.  I just can't ping it from any of the machines behind my router/modem/ip address.  I've change no router or network settings in the last 12 hours that I'm aware of.

My ip address is 86.30.188.162 if that's of any help.

[urstroyer]

I'm not currently able to connect to the pool (yourbtc.net:8999, s15747378.onlinehome-server.info:8999) or the site (either http or https), nor do I get a response when pinging yourbtc.net.  Any idea on the cause?  Is this a common problem?

Hi teukon,

sounds like a routing problem. Server and all services are up and running.

Could you try to connect your miner to 87.106.84.25:8999 as a workaround?

If you are on irc you find me on #yourbtc / irc.freenode.net to figure this out.

Best regards,

Chris

No joy.  Substituting 87.106.84.25 for yourbtc.net make no difference to site access, pool access, or ping.  Everything looks dead.  I'm fully able to use pretty much any other site.  Furthermore, the site and pool were working fine for me when I signed up and I got in about 12 hours of good mining.

I'm afraid I'm not on irc.

Thanks for the help.

EDIT: http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/yourbtc.net says the site is fine.  Also, I'm able to ssh into a machine with a different ip address and ping yourbtc.net.  I just can't ping it from any of the machines behind my router/modem/ip address.  I've change no router or network settings in the last 12 hours that I'm aware of.

My ip address is 86.30.188.162 if that's of any help.

Got the same result when sending a ping to your machine from my server. I can reach you without a problem from my connection @home.

I'am afraid, i can't offer a solution until tomorrow. My server hosting company has to investigate this issue.

If you have a dynamic ip adress, try to reconnect your internet to get a new ip.

[teukon]

Got the same result when sending a ping to your machine from my server. I can reach you without a problem from my connection @home.

I'am afraid, i can't offer a solution until tomorrow. My server hosting company has to investigate this issue.

If you have a dynamic ip adress, try to reconnect your internet to get a new ip.

It's possible that my ISP gave me a new ip address in the night and that simply asking for a new one (keeping the modem off for long enough) would get things working again.  However, it does seem strange that yourbtc.net can only handle certain ip addresses.

I'm using another pool at the moment but I'll be back when I can get onto yourbtc.net without trickery.

[teukon]

I've just discovered that I have the same problem with "en.wikipedia.org" so I started hunting for other bad sites.  Most sites I tried worked fine, including: "www.google.com", "slashdot.org", "www.gamefaqs.com", "www.bbc.co.uk".  I found that "www.ebay.co.uk" and "senseis.xmp.net" were also problematic so your site is not alone.  I know that networking problems are most commonly a computer settings, router, or modem problem, but I think at this point I suspect my ISP has screwed up.

Thanks for your help anyway, hopefully I'll resolve this issue soon and be back with you.

EDIT:  Yes, my ISP (Virgin Media, UK) is having major problems.  The problems are nationwide too!  I've set up a quick proxy for browsing but will wait until things are back to normal rejoining this pool.  I'm sorry if I caused you much trouble and thank you for the help.

[urstroyer]

No problem, i'am glad to get at least some feedback

Glad to see you back.

BTW:
If you have any feature request feel free to open a ticket under Pool Development & Support.
I try to make everything possible, to make it everyone comfortable using this pool.

[teukon]

May I ask how the "estimated loyalty bonus" is calculated?  Should I expect my estimated loyalty bonus to increase as I add more shares to my total for the month?

[urstroyer]

May I ask how the "estimated loyalty bonus" is calculated?  Should I expect my estimated loyalty bonus to increase as I add more shares to my total for the month?

Exactly, thats the way it works at the moment. You get a proportional peace of cake at the end of month. Everyday single share which was submitted this month will count.

Please note, thats a workaround, to offer a replacement for the currently missing merged mining feature.
The final goal is to include payout for merged mining rewards and of course transaction fees on found block into the double geometric method.

[teukon]

Exactly, thats the way it works at the moment. You get a propotional peace of cake at the end of month. Everyday single share which was submitted this month will count.

Please note, thats a workaround, to offer a replacement for the currently missing merged mining feature.
The final goal is to include payout for merged mining rewards and of course transaction fees on found block into the double geometric method.

The reason I ask is that my estimated loyalty bonus is not increasing as quickly as my estimated payout.  I was simply after the formulae used to arrive at these two figures.

Thanks.

[freshzive]

Switched to yourbtc from deepbit the other day during the DDOS outages. So far, it's looking great Seems like I'm making more BTC here than with deepbit even after donating a little bit. Cheers for the hard work.

[teukon]

I'm slighly confused by the new work pushes I'm currently receiving.  Some new jobs come with a BTC block number and they correlate quite well with the blocks reported by the Bitcoin block explorer.  However, I can't find a clean correspondence between new jobs and Namecoin blocks and this worries me.  Is this normal?  I really would expect to receive a new job for every new Namecoin block.

For 21:00 -> 22:00 UTC (2011-10-24)

My received new jobs:
  03:38 (BTC 150495)
  08:43 (BTC 150496)
  18:43
  23:07 (BTC 150497)
  33:07
  43:08
  46:48 (BTC 150498)
  56:48
  57:31 (BTC 150499)

Bitcoin block explorer:
  02:57, 150495
  08:00, 150496
  22:24, 150497
  44:08, 150498
  56:31, 150499

Namecoin block explorer:
  09:51, 24197
  16:29, 24198
  24:25, 24199
  32:00, 24200
  34:29, 24201
  40:03, 24202
  45:29, 24203
  45:59, 24204
  50:10, 24205
  55:45, 24206

Thoughts?

[urstroyer]

I'm slighly confused by the new work pushes I'm currently receiving.  Some new jobs come with a BTC block number and they correlate quite well with the blocks reported by the Bitcoin block explorer.  However, I can't find a clean correspondence between new jobs and Namecoin blocks and this worries me.  Is this normal?  I really would expect to receive a new job for every new Namecoin block.

For 21:00 -> 22:00 UTC (2011-10-24)

My received new jobs:
  03:38 (BTC 150495)
  08:43 (BTC 150496)
  18:43
  23:07 (BTC 150497)
  33:07
  43:08
  46:48 (BTC 150498)
  56:48
  57:31 (BTC 150499)

Bitcoin block explorer:
  02:57, 150495
  08:00, 150496
  22:24, 150497
  44:08, 150498
  56:31, 150499

Namecoin block explorer:
  09:51, 24197
  16:29, 24198
  24:25, 24199
  32:00, 24200
  34:29, 24201
  40:03, 24202
  45:29, 24203
  45:59, 24204
  50:10, 24205
  55:45, 24206

Thoughts?

I have addressed a similar issue to the poolserverj dev here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=33144.msg591274#msg591274

We switched back to our stable non-mm enviroment, these side effects should not appear anymore.

Added 5 BTC in our bonus pool to compensate your non merged mining earnings yet. I have faith in shadders, that he will release a working mm psj version soon

[teukon]

I have addressed a similar issue to the poolserverj dev here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=33144.msg591274#msg591274

We switched back to our stable non-mm enviroment, these side effects should not appear anymore.

Added 5 BTC in our bonus pool to compensate your non merged mining earnings yet. I have faith in shadders, that he will release a working mm psj version soon

I'm glad to hear the issue is known and am looking forward to a working merged mining system.