[ANNOUNCE] Electrum - Lightweight Bitcoin Client

[ThomasV]

I just tried the latest changes (0.42, straight from the source tree)
and can confirm that recovery from seed is OK for me now!

Thanks.

Good. please note that this isn not the final 0.42 version.
if you encounter bugs, do 'git pull' to update your version

[flatfly]

Er.. is it just me or are all servers down?  Will try a git pull

[flatfly]

yep, seems to be fine now!

[moocow1452]

Any chance of Litecoin support being folded in or offered in a separate client?

[hazek]

BTW it would really help you if you had your code reviewed by someone with good reputation and given a stamp of approval to raise you're trustworthiness especially since you're client is talking to your server.

If you've already done that, I apologize, but I didn't find it mentioned on your webpage.

[ThomasV]

BTW it would really help you if you had your code reviewed by someone with good reputation and given a stamp of approval to raise you're trustworthiness especially since you're client is talking to your server.

If you've already done that, I apologize, but I didn't find it mentioned on your webpage.

it depends on what kind of review you are talking about..
 - if you are talking about checking that the code does not contain covert malware that will steal your coins, that's fairly easy to do. the code is short, and I am sure a few people here have looked at it before they run it. it is almost impossible to hide malware in an open-source project.
 - if you want someone to check that there are no bugs in the code, then that's much more difficult. All programs have bugs. However, keep in mind that there is intrinsic security with deterministic wallets; if a bug causes a corruption of your wallet file, then you can always recover your wallet from the seed, using another version of the program.

[hazek]

The first one.

And yes, anyone can check an open source project what it does but:
1st: I had no idea if it was open source, I didn't research everything you information you have to offer on it but I didn't notice it
2nd: not everyone is a programmer and can read code

So my suggestion was just something to help you get a wider user base be more comfortable in using not, not some sort of an accusation or something..

[molecular]

The first one.

And yes, anyone can check an open source project what it does but:
1st: I had no idea if it was open source, I didn't research everything you information you have to offer on it but I didn't notice it
2nd: not everyone is a programmer and can read code

So my suggestion was just something to help you get a wider user base be more comfortable in using not, not some sort of an accusation or something..

You don't have to be able to read code.

The fact that there are no posts of people in this thread claiming to have found malicious code in electrum should gain quite a bit of your trust. You must assume that there actually are people doing that, though.

Of course it's not impossible that ThomasV could sneak something into some update release and it would go unnoticed for a while (once anyone notices, he could immediately transfer all the coins). I would assume it would be noticed pretty quickly and a big fat red post would appear here.

Your suggestion of having a one-time audit done by someone trusted would not help against that either.

[marcus_of_augustus]

Also, it is likely that slush has had a good look over electrum as part of the stratum project .... so there is at least one independent validation, I'm sure there are others.

On another point, do we have any idea of how many electrum clients are active out there?

[NothinG]

Also, it is likely that slush has had a good look over electrum as part of the stratum project .... so there is at least one independent validation, I'm sure there are others.

On another point, do we have any idea of how many electrum clients are active out there?

+1
I use mine for a quick exchange when I don't feel like grabbing my yubikey. Laziness, FTW.

I was interested in setting up a server myself, but haven't had time.

[ThomasV]

Also, it is likely that slush has had a good look over electrum as part of the stratum project .... so there is at least one independent validation, I'm sure there are others.

On another point, do we have any idea of how many electrum clients are active out there?

I am currently working with genjix on the definition of the stratum/overnet protocol, and on the integration of libbitcoin in the server code.
The new protocol will follow the recommendations included in the document written by slush.
However, that document defines only the transport of messages, not their content.
This is what we are doing now.

Here is the current state of the protocol: https://bitcoinconsultancy.com/wiki/Intersango/Overnet#Current_Electrum_protocol
This specification is fully implemented and working with my server. It also works with Electrum 0.42 (to be released soon).

However, the new protocol still needs to be polished.
For that reason, the native protocol will still be used by default in the client, until the new stratum protocol is stable and deployed on all available servers.

[ThomasV]

update: version 0.42 is available.

there are no new user-visible features, except fixes for bugs reported in the forum.
the main change is in the communication interface:
this client supports the (still experimental) stratum protocol on ports 50001 and 8081

the Electrum server at ecdsa.org supports 3 protocols:
 - native protocol, on port 50000
 - stratum/tcp on port 50001 (experimental)
 - stratum/http on port 8081 (experimental)

[hazek]

Does your client support choosing from which addresses it takes bitcoins for an amount exceeding the amount stored on any particular address? More simply put, can I choose from which one of my addresses can I send bitcoins?

[ThomasV]

Does your client support choosing from which addresses it takes bitcoins for an amount exceeding the amount stored on any particular address? More simply put, can I choose from which one of my addresses can I send bitcoins?

not with the gui, but there are command line options that give you that possibililty

[hazek]

Would be really cool if you could code that into the GUI

[flatfly]

Hi Thomas,

thanks for the new 0.42 release!
there does seem to be a minor regression (for me, at least):
the Wall tab is broken (since one of the March 23 changes, I believe).
It just doesn't display anything anymore.

Could you have a look? Not sure if it's a Windows-only bug.

Also, just to let you know, I have posted a Windows self-contained
binary build of the latest release in this thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=73651.0

It's a much smaller download than previous Windows builds, requires no
additional dependencies and seems to be extremely stable.

Thanks again!

[ThomasV]

Hi Thomas,

thanks for the new 0.42 release!
there does seem to be a minor regression (for me, at least):
the Wall tab is broken (since one of the March 23 changes, I believe).
It just doesn't display anything anymore.

Could you have a look? Not sure if it's a Windows-only bug.

indeed, I fixed it. thanks!

Also, just to let you know, I have posted a Windows self-contained
binary build of the latest release in this thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=73651.0

It's a much smaller download than previous Windows builds, requires no
additional dependencies and seems to be extremely stable.

thanks for that binary. the screenshot looks nice

[bravetheheat]

hey, I seem to keep getting socket errors. They come every once in a while and soon fill up my entire console window.

[ThomasV]

hey, I seem to keep getting socket errors. They come every once in a while and soon fill up my entire console window.

it's probably me.
when I work on the server, I disconnect and reconnect it right away

[ThomasV]

Hello,

I just released Electrum 0.43. 
You can get it from http://ecdsa.org/electrum

Changelog:
* this version fixes the wallet recovery issues encountered with 0.42
* support for the stratum protocol (over tcp and http).
* The default interface is now stratum/tcp; it is faster than the native interface.

This client still supports the native protocol, because the stratum interface is still in beta stage and might be modified.