[announce] Namecoin - a distributed naming system based on Bitcoin

[khal]

You guys need to hurry up :

-rescan functionality still not working
-wallet encryption not working
-GUI nowhere to be found
-alternate clients without TX fees requirement ?

They will be open for help I'm sure.

If you were a paying customer it may be different .... but you are not.

Indeed, help is welcome.
-rescan : what is your problem, this must work !?
-wallet encryption not working : of course, because the feature does not exist
-GUI nowhere to be found : Voicedotbit & NamecoinGUI, see : http://dot-bit.org/Tasks-NamecoinGUI
-alternate clients without TX fees requirement ? : Do you know you can force tx fees to 0 in bitcoin (search paytxfee) ? Same for namecoin ! What a revelation !

Because they're pretty much opening up arbitrary toplevel domains to whoever has deep enough pockets and the facilities to run a name registry.
The risk is that *someone* wants to run the .bit space, whether for its own sake, or to deliberately bring the space namecoin is trying to occupy back under control.
I have no real idea how likely that is  - but the mere possibility makes .bit less attractive.

I guess there will be no real solution against that for .bit, but the probability is very low...
But, JohnDoe explained why we shouldn't worry (from: http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1257#p1257) :

My opinion is that we shouldn't worry too much about it. Firstly this is only for very established companies, orgs and institutions. You need to pay 185k upfront with no security that your application will be accepted, and if it does you need to pay a yearly upkeep of 20k or something like that. To register a tld you need proof of ownership too (google can't register .apple) so with some help we could probably appeal a registration (there is a formal period for this in the registration process). It looks like a whole round of application takes quite a while, like a year or more, so if nobody tries to register .bit during the first round (applications close in February I think) then we would be able to gather quite a bit of evidence of prior use and possibly support from organizations like the EFF before the second round starts.

From our end we also have the advantage that .bit is in no way hardcoded (names are registered like d/name without the .bit tld) so it can be changed at will by the nameservers if there's a need for it. This further discourages people from shelling out 185k just to try to attack us.

Another solution would be to choose a second TLD that ICANN is not able to take. Something with 1 letter, with numbers ? I don't really know all the rules about that, so, help is welcome too.

[Gabi]

What happens when the .bit domain gets officially used by ICANN? Has anyone thought about that?

Nothing? Since namecoin is a different dns system, the two can work together. Of course you need to tell your browser if the .bit address you are looking for is a namecoin one or a normal icann one.

That situation seems decidedly un-nothing-like to me, and awfully browser-centric.

As it currently stands, DNS resolver operators can add transparent support for the .bit space 'as if' it were the same as any other toplevel domain.
Scripts/email systems etc can then resolve .bit names without specific configuration.

The fact that ICANN may effectively yank this mode of operation out from under us (you can bet nearly all resolver operators will revert to resolving official ICANN names) is surely a risk which may make it hard to convince operators to support it in the first place.

Just make a plugin or something like that for the browser? You want to use namecoin dns, you activate the plugin and all addresses will be considered namecoin addresses.
Otherwise, well, normal ones.

[ehmdjii]

if i want mit dot bit domain to mirror or redirect to a regular dot com domain, what should i put in the map json?

[julz]

What happens when the .bit domain gets officially used by ICANN? Has anyone thought about that?

Nothing? Since namecoin is a different dns system, the two can work together. Of course you need to tell your browser if the .bit address you are looking for is a namecoin one or a normal icann one.

That situation seems decidedly un-nothing-like to me, and awfully browser-centric.

As it currently stands, DNS resolver operators can add transparent support for the .bit space 'as if' it were the same as any other toplevel domain.
Scripts/email systems etc can then resolve .bit names without specific configuration.

The fact that ICANN may effectively yank this mode of operation out from under us (you can bet nearly all resolver operators will revert to resolving official ICANN names) is surely a risk which may make it hard to convince operators to support it in the first place.

Just make a plugin or something like that for the browser? You want to use namecoin dns, you activate the plugin and all addresses will be considered namecoin addresses.
Otherwise, well, normal ones.

You still seem to be being browser-centric.  I have servers which don't even have a browser on them - and if .bit ever gains wider traction, I'd like them to be able to resolve .bit names.  (for email, serverside api requests etc)
If various applications that might need to talk to your .bit domain need to be specifically configured or even reprogrammed - it greatly reduces the utility of the whole idea.

I guess it may still have some niche uses even if it's unable to be used in a properly integrated way with DNS - but I hope that as Khal suggests, the probability of ICANN allocating .bit to a registry is low. 

Already I notice the situation with .bit domains is less than ideal in the chrome browser at least.   
A non-existant .bit name is treated differently to a non-existant .com name.
A bogus .com name brings up the webpage not available screen indicating a DNS error, but if I put in a bogus .bit name - the chrome search feature is activated.  Somehow under the covers chrome seems to treat .bit differently to other toplevel domains.

[Red Emerald]

You still seem to be being browser-centric.  I have servers which don't even have a browser on them - and if .bit ever gains wider traction, I'd like them to be able to resolve .bit names.  (for email, serverside api requests etc)
If various applications that might need to talk to your .bit domain need to be specifically configured or even reprogrammed - it greatly reduces the utility of the whole idea.

This is easy to do on a server with a socks proxy or by setting up your own DNS server.

[julz]

You still seem to be being browser-centric.  I have servers which don't even have a browser on them - and if .bit ever gains wider traction, I'd like them to be able to resolve .bit names.  (for email, serverside api requests etc)
If various applications that might need to talk to your .bit domain need to be specifically configured or even reprogrammed - it greatly reduces the utility of the whole idea.

This is easy to do on a server with a socks proxy or by setting up your own DNS server.

I already have a DNS resolving server set up to transparently resolve .bit names.  I'm discussing the hypothetical situation where the .bit namespace is allocated by ICANN to some registrar.
While I tend to agree it 'probably' won't happen - it's not so easy to evangelize a system based on such a fuzzy 'probably'.
I guess we just have to hope .bit can get enough traction as a useful alternative system that ICANN will at some point be more or less forced to interoperate with it.

[bulanula]

You still seem to be being browser-centric.  I have servers which don't even have a browser on them - and if .bit ever gains wider traction, I'd like them to be able to resolve .bit names.  (for email, serverside api requests etc)
If various applications that might need to talk to your .bit domain need to be specifically configured or even reprogrammed - it greatly reduces the utility of the whole idea.

This is easy to do on a server with a socks proxy or by setting up your own DNS server.

Yeah like Joe Average will do that. No chance. Namecoin just slipped and is now under SLC and BTC. Sad.

[Red Emerald]

You still seem to be being browser-centric.  I have servers which don't even have a browser on them - and if .bit ever gains wider traction, I'd like them to be able to resolve .bit names.  (for email, serverside api requests etc)
If various applications that might need to talk to your .bit domain need to be specifically configured or even reprogrammed - it greatly reduces the utility of the whole idea.

This is easy to do on a server with a socks proxy or by setting up your own DNS server.

Yeah like Joe Average will do that. No chance. Namecoin just slipped and is now under SLC and BTC. Sad.

Joe Average doesn't run servers...

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

-alternate clients without TX fees requirement ? : Do you know you can force tx fees to 0 in bitcoin (search paytxfee) ? Same for namecoin ! What a revelation !

But did you merge forced non-zero TX fees from Bitcoin ?
If so, then paytxfee setting might not work in some cases.

Current bitcoin client forces everybody to pay fees even if they are not necessary.
This is the reason why i created NFTF Bitcoin client fork.

Is this the case with namecoin ?

[khal]

Red Emerald, julz :
Here is what currently exists to browse .bit domains :
- http://dot-bit.org/HowToBrowseBitDomains
- http://dot-bit.org/DNS_and_Proxy_softwares
- http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=349
Nothing is browser centric, even proxy softwares. Most people will use proxies with browsers, because that's most usages. But nothing will stop them to use proxies also in FTP clients, etc.

But did you merge forced non-zero TX fees from Bitcoin ?
If so, then paytxfee setting might not work in some cases.

Namecoin use this function too :

Code:

    static bool AllowFree(double dPriority)
    {
        // Large (in bytes) low-priority (new, small-coin) transactions
        // need a fee.
        return dPriority > COIN * 144 / 250;
    }

So, some tx may require a fee of 0.0005NMC (0.00000657BTC).

I've just been "flooded" with +3000 tx of 0.00000001NMC and allowing a fee of 0 in that case would be a bit dangerous for the network (was it you testing ?). This function may not be perfect, but this is another problem.

[Red Emerald]

I'm discussing the hypothetical situation where the .bit namespace is allocated by ICANN to some registrar.
While I tend to agree it 'probably' won't happen - it's not so easy to evangelize a system based on such a fuzzy 'probably'.

If ICANN ever officially allocates .bit, then the namecoin network can switch to something else like .nmc.  That is why the name records are "d/blah" not "blah.bit."  I'm pretty sure I read a nice explanation of this on dot-bit.org, but now I can't find it.

[tysat]

I'm discussing the hypothetical situation where the .bit namespace is allocated by ICANN to some registrar.
While I tend to agree it 'probably' won't happen - it's not so easy to evangelize a system based on such a fuzzy 'probably'.

If ICANN ever officially allocates .bit, then the namecoin network can switch to something else like .nmc.  That is why the name records are "d/blah" not "blah.bit."  I'm pretty sure I read a nice explanation of this on dot-bit.org, but now I can't find it.

http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=309&p=2049&hilit=icann#p2049

That thread links to two others which talk about how the TLD doesn't matter at all.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

But did you merge forced non-zero TX fees from Bitcoin ?
If so, then paytxfee setting might not work in some cases.

Namecoin use this function too :

Code:

    static bool AllowFree(double dPriority)
    {
        // Large (in bytes) low-priority (new, small-coin) transactions
        // need a fee.
        return dPriority > COIN * 144 / 250;
    }

So, some tx may require a fee of 0.0005NMC (0.00000657BTC).

I just looked up your code and you definately do not allow free transactions, just like the mainline client.

This is the code responsible (src/wallet.cpp):

Code:

                bool fAllowFree = CTransaction::AllowFree(dPriority);
                int64 nMinFee = wtxNew.GetMinFee(1, fAllowFree);

In my fork i change it to following, to revert to default 0.3.20 behavior, which allows sending coins without fee, always.

Code:

                //Bitcoin NFTF Patch - by ShadowOfHarbringer START
                bool fAllowFree = true;
                int64 nMinFee = wtxNew.GetMinFee(1, fAllowFree);
                //Bitcoin NFTF Patch - by ShadowOfHarbringer END

However this is not a proper fix, but a quick & dirty fix.

If you are interested in "good fix", there is a patch for the mainline client created by Luke-Jr here.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=46925.msg639340#msg639340

[phelix]

for those of you interested there is a discussion going on about flaws in namecoin and an alternative decentralized p2p dns system: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=64279.0

the p2p dns train is gaining momentum again

[phelix]

fyi:

Namecoin support via DNS-Suffix now working:

http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2584#p2584


This is a reasonable approach, querying the special DNS-Server only for Namecoin domains.

Installation is as simple as adding a registry key (windows).

[marcus_of_augustus]

fyi:

Namecoin support via DNS-Suffix now working:

http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2584#p2584


This is a reasonable approach, querying the special DNS-Server only for Namecoin domains.

Installation is as simple as adding a registry key (windows).

Awesome solution. This makes .bit websites much more easily accessible.

[goodlord666]

Can't we get rid of that .bit thing and turn every registered domain into a TLD?

What's the use in sticking to this 3-letter TLD nonsense, seriously now?

[Raoul Duke]

Can't we get rid of that .bit thing and turn every registered domain into a TLD?

What's the use in sticking to this 3-letter TLD nonsense, seriously now?

/nods in agreement

[matthewh3]

Someone needs to make a Chrome extension to view '.bit' domains or something else making it very easy to view '.bit' domains or it will hinder its adoption being unable to easily view the sites.

[tysat]

Someone needs to make a Chrome extension to view '.bit' domains or something else making it very easy to view '.bit' domains or it will hinder its adoption being unable to easily view the sites.

See http://dot-bit.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2584#p2584 for easy viewing of .bit domains.