What is fork?

[SeW900]

Hi, I've been in cryptocurrency in few years doing bounties and trading but not really into technical terms such as setting up nodes and mining but I have one thing I'm curious about, It's all about fork. I've seen a lot of coins in the past and lately about fork but i don't know how that works and why do they need that thing? i tried to read online but it's too technical for me.

Enlighten me please

[joeperry]

I'm not really that technical guy but I think I can explain it as easy as I can to make you understand it more and for those new crypto users who are still thinking too what really a fork is

What is Fork?
Every coin has a software. Just think of any software, and then after some time that software needs an update/upgrade of software or maybe a protocol update... and that's what the fork is.

There are 2 types of Fork:

1. HARD FORK
Think of any software that has an update with a new features once you update it you cannot return again to the previous version (An example is IOS version upgrade).
This is irreversible meaning cannot go back again to last version.

In technical terms it is permanent and requires all nodes and users to upgrade to the latest version of the software/wallets to be upgraded.

2. SOFT FORK
Think of any software that once you update you can turn back again to your last update.
Let's say that this doensn't full update for everyone but only miners are required because they're the one who will enfore the change.

Why do they fork?
For what I've known it's because of the new implementations/new features and sometimes because of the miners are splitting.

Some of the things stated here are according to the articles that I've read before and according to my experience in the cryptocurrency industry I may say that I'm not a 100% correct but I think I gave you some ideas about what a fork is.

I hope I enlightened you a little bit 

[r1a2y3m4]

Please correct me if I'm wrong with my information. Let me make it simple for you. The fork event is to double a coin in order to create another altcoin. For example, Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash. Bitcoin cash is the forked BTC and Bitcoin is the original.

[Artemis3]

You have to understand Free Open Source software to understand what a fork is.
When you use free open source software, you might want to do things differently to what the author intended. You might have a great idea the author hates, well you can go ahead and modify it and distribute your version, that is the freedom of open source, and is "a fork".

There is also the fork in a blockchain, but that is similar to a fork in a road.



A "soft fork" means the country dirt road you were following might become paved from that point on, even if your horses where fine walking over dirt, it now allows bicycles and automobiles to move faster.

A "hard fork" means the country dirt road now splits in two, one is exactly the same, the other one is paved from that point on. Of course "forks" might now always be better, they can be worse...

Examples:

BCH forked from BTC, and then BCHABC/BCHSV from BCH...
Libreoffice forked from Openoffice, Xorg forked from Xfree86...

Freedom allows anyone to do a fork, that doesn't mean it will always succeed. And sometimes even the fork ideas get implemented in the original.

[Velkro]

Please correct me if I'm wrong with my information. Let me make it simple for you. The fork event is to double a coin in order to create another altcoin. For example, Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash. Bitcoin cash is the forked BTC and Bitcoin is the original.

I would say its bad words that you chosen because doubling could mean that some coin is less valuable if understood wrong.
I would say its changing rules of Coin and people that want old rules follow old chain, and other people follow new rules so new chain. So two coins from one, each with different rules.
Its fork.

[bitkube]

there are three, softfork, hardfork and fork a coin. softfork and hardfork has been explain above.

fork a coin means you clone a coin and create a new coin with new genesis and blockchain. you need at least 2 nodes in order to make your new coin/blockchain live.

there are list of coins that has been fork from for example bitcoin, bytecoin, monero and others. you can refer to this website https://mapofcoins.com/ and https://forkmaps.com

[Artemis3]

there are three, softfork, hardfork and fork a coin. softfork and hardfork has been explain above.

fork a coin means you clone a coin and create a new coin with new genesis and blockchain. you need at least 2 nodes in order to make your new coin/blockchain live.

That's the same as the software fork i explained above, Litecoin being the first. Bitcoin is free open source software, anyone can take it, change it, and start it again from zero. That is not really a "coin fork" (that term would actually be misleading). Of course forking the bitcoin software usually produces a different coin...