Downloading the blockchain over public WiFi

[Jet Cash]

I thought I would set up a new node using Cafe/restaurant WiFi as an experiment. Some Cafes block Bitcoin, but the one I'm in at the moment seems toi support Core. The one I am using at the moment has a link speed of 173/173 mBits. Core is stating that it will take 13 weeks to complete, and that is with a 24 hour connection. Obviously it will take far longer with intermittent connections. I can see me getting bored in a few days, and I may scrounge a cable connection to speed things up. I'll try to resist this, and keep this as a digital nomad project.

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[PawGo]

I have a mixed feelings in general, as I think you may abuse terms of use or causing problems as other users may be affected by heavy use of bandwidth, or depending on location owner may have a limited transfer connection, but it is a different problem.
What is the purpose of that test? If you have slow connection it is obvious the download take a lot of time and slow cpu or slow hdd are no bottlenecks in that case.
Talking about being "digital nomad" - I think it would have more sense to keep your own copy of blocks & indexes somewhere on pendrive, or if you really really must start from 0, to have a trusted source for predownloaded blocks (like for example http://blockdata.loyce.club *)

*) I do not guarantee the files are OK, ask him ;^)

[Jet Cash]

Well it's now reporting that it "only" needs 21 hours to completion, so that is much more manageable. The cafe is pretty empty, and nobody else is using a computer at the moment, but I understand your concern. for public welfare. I've just discovered that I can install a second NVME M2 drive, and the possible max seems to be 4Tb, so that changes things again.
I started this project to experiment with moving wallet and blockchain files around, and using this to improve my security. I may have been on this forum for several years, but I still have a lot to learn about Bitcoin. It's time I improved my knowledge about running nodes in a mobile environment.

[darkv0rt3x]

Well it's now reporting that it "only" needs 21 hours to completion, so that is much more manageable. The cafe is pretty empty, and nobody else is using a computer at the moment, but I understand your concern. for public welfare. I've just discovered that I can install a second NVME M2 drive, and the possible max seems to be 4Tb, so that changes things again.
I started this project to experiment with moving wallet and blockchain files around, and using this to improve my security. I may have been on this forum for several years, but I still have a lot to learn about Bitcoin. It's time I improved my knowledge about running nodes in a mobile environment.

It is never late to learn and opt in.
I myself am more or less hhalf of your age and I'm learning things about Bitcoin everyday! Last 2 things that I'm doing just for fun are:
1 - Writting scripts to automate certain things on my LN node!
2 - Writting a program to save private info in an eeprom chip!

[Casdinyard]

What are you getting out of this OP?

Are you doing this because you can? Then I'm sad to say but you'll need to shut it down. I don't need to explain how unsecure and dangerous these types of connections are, not to mention the fact that you'll inconvenience people who are hoping to get free internet access when they needed it the most. If you could download the blockchain using your home internet, please do it for the sake of convenience and the sanity of the people who'll connect to that public wifi service.

[Jet Cash]

I've given up living in a bricks and mortar home, so I don't have a cable connection to fall back on.
What am I getting out of this? Well, I wantr to help those amongst us who have decided to reject the authoritan control that is being imposed by the Eton/Oxford elite (what some peopole call the deep state). Bitcoin is a valuable financial tool, and it should be available to anyone who wants to use and support it. Bitcoin itself is stable and secure, but there  are problems for many in understanding its operation, and finding safe methods to use it. I'm aware that using a new computer with a Windows operating system is insecure, even more so when linked over public WiFi, but this is an olption that is forced onto many of the new breed of digital nomads.
What impact will my activities have on other cafe users? I'm running core in the background, and I see no noticeable degradation in the performance of any foreground jobs. I suspect core may make fewer demands than some of the games and videos that other users may run over the WiFi here. I'm in the Asda cafe at the moment. It's 0730, and I'm the only person here. There might be a couple of salesman arrive later to look at spreadsheets, but other than that, usage is likely to be light. If things do get busy, then of course I will close down core.
Update on progress.
The Asda WiFi is running at 144/144 mbs. However it is telling me that I have 33 hours left to complettion. It was only 20 when I closed down at Sainsbury's yesterday. I looked at the new core panels, and I'm having problems creating a receiving address for test purposes. I've created two wallets, and I'm not sure of the ramifications of that. Core seems to have been improved dramatically over the last 3 years, so I need to do some serious reading I think I have done enough to prove the viability of running a full node over public WiFi, so I'll stop core shortly due to hard drive limitations. I'm using a Core i5 notebook with 8Gb of ram and a 512Gb hard drive, and that isn't large enough for the full blockchain. I believe that this machine has a second slot for an NVME M.2 drive, so I'll purchase one of those and install it for the blockchain and wallet data. I'm tending towards a Samsung 2Tb, and I'll check to see which is the fastest and most reliable. I'll stay with Windows for the moment, as there is no security risk  with an empty wallet. The next stage is to open the box, and check that there really is a second ssd socket, and discover the type and form factor. It seems the most difficult task is finding a securing screw for it. Maybe I'll make a couple of videos for you tube.

[ABCbits]

I remember you already perform initial block download in past (probably from one of your thread/post about 2-4 years ago). Why don't you just copy the folder (which contain Blockchain and other necessary file) from that device to your current device? That way you only need to download more recent blocks.

Talking about being "digital nomad" - I think it would have more sense to keep your own copy of blocks & indexes somewhere on pendrive, or if you really really must start from 0, to have a trusted source for predownloaded blocks (like for example http://blockdata.loyce.club *)

*) I do not guarantee the files are OK, ask him ;^)

Based on filename and file extension, it's not in format which accepted by Bitcoin Core.

[Jet Cash]

I remember you already perform initial block download in past (probably from one of your thread/post about 2-4 years ago). Why don't you just copy the folder (which contain Blockchain and other necessary file) from that device to your current device? That way you only need to download more recent blocks.

It was a bit longer than 4 years ago I'm afraid. I used to maintain it whilst drinking coffee in McDonald's, but during all the Covid scammy nonsesnse it became impractical to stay for any length of time in a restaurant/cafe. I inadvertedly turned my main blockchain into a pruned version, so I decided I would start again from scratch, and practice some recovery and chain moving methods. I've got about 5 versions of the blockchain and wallets, but none is up to date. I'm quite pleased that I'm doing this, as I'm learning quite a lot about the current version of core. After an initial temper tantrum, I've decided that I like the latest version.

Afternoon update,
I'm now in the Morrison's cafe, and it blocks the Bitcoin ports. Obviously they don't want customers to use Bitcoin. They keep turning off cash on the do-it-youself checkouts, so it looks as if they will be big on CBDCs. They let me use cpanel on my Kat1 multi-domain hosting plan, but they block the plan on Kuffy.com. It's probably time I did a supermarket cafe review for digital nomads. Sainsbury's looks best for Bitcoin, Asda is best for web site management, and Morrison's is best for fish and chips.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Some Cafes block Bitcoin

Wait, what? Which cafeterias try to block Bitcoin? Also, what do you mean they "block" Bitcoin? There is no central server to prohibit access to. Did you perhaps mean bitcoin.org?

I'd advice you to do everything through Tor. The last thing you want, especially if the cafeteria is bitcoin-unfriendly, is to have some merchant suing you for whatever. With Tor the Internet provider, right as well as the router admin, know absolutely nothing. Without it, it's trivial to notice someone's syncing the Bitcoin network.

[DaveF]

Some Cafes block Bitcoin

Wait, what? Which cafeterias try to block Bitcoin? Also, what do you mean they "block" Bitcoin? There is no central server to prohibit access to. Did you perhaps mean bitcoin.org?

I'd advice you to do everything through Tor. The last thing you want, especially if the cafeteria is bitcoin-unfriendly, is to have some merchant suing you for whatever. With Tor the Internet provider, right as well as the router admin, know absolutely nothing. Without it, it's trivial to notice someone's syncing the Bitcoin network.

\

They block port 8333. Or a lot of times it's the other way, they only allow traffic on ports 80 (http) and 443 (https) and everything else is blocked. They may allow certain mail RECEIVING ports (110,143,993,995) and perhaps 587 for authenticated mail send but that's it. It's free, but they don't want to deal with the hassle of people doing anything other then browsing the web. So it's all blocked. I do that for a lot of my customers who want to offer public Wi-Fi. It really is more of free web browsing, for anything else get your own internet.

Depending on the equipment you use and the amount of configuration you want to put into it you can even block TOR to a certain extent.

<shrug>

Probably does not matter since there are enough places that don't block things.

-Dave

[NeuroticFish]

I'm now in the Morrison's cafe, and it blocks the Bitcoin ports. Obviously they don't want customers to use Bitcoin.

I would expect the places that have hired 3rd party company as "sysadmin" would block most of the unusual ports.
It's not necessarily related to Bitcoin, but I guess that they also don't want people download torrents and other big stuff over their connection (since this also tends to make it unusable for most of the other customers in many cases, I think).

Tunneling may be the solution (although I think that's slower). But I don't know how to do that.

[zanezane]

I thought I would set up a new node using Cafe/restaurant WiFi as an experiment. Some Cafes block Bitcoin, but the one I'm in at the moment seems toi support Core. The one I am using at the moment has a link speed of 173/173 mBits. Core is stating that it will take 13 weeks to complete, and that is with a 24 hour connection. Obviously it will take far longer with intermittent connections. I can see me getting bored in a few days, and I may scrounge a cable connection to speed things up. I'll try to resist this, and keep this as a digital nomad project.

I think it's not advisable to use a public wifi downloading the blockchain because of some risk. Public wifi networks are typically unsecured and can be easily compromised by hackers who may intercept your connection and steal your private information.

Downloading the blockchain isa resource-intensive process that requires a lot of bandwidth and time. Doing so over a public WiFi network increases the chances of the download getting interrupted, resulting in wasted time and bandwidth. and also could potentially violate the network's terms and service, which could lead to legal consequences.