ORA:: Development discussion thread

[nioccoin]

When can we expect updates from nio?

Hi, I'm lurking, absorbing the roadsigns for what direction the community is taking everything.

Already, in the past couple of weeks it looks like we have gone from kora to ora, and a logo contest is wide open.

This began as an "organic" system, and remains that way.  Ora has taken on a life of its own, which is what we want anyway.  The community is driving it forward in spurts.  We are now seeing more folks becoming involved.  I'm seeing some new names take the reigns of parts of Ora and drive it in creative directions.

As new ideas and directions emerge, I am modifying my own processes to fit them in to the master plan.

kind regards,
nio

[Kora]

When can we expect updates from nio?

Hi, I'm lurking, absorbing the roadsigns for what direction the community is taking everything.

Already, in the past couple of weeks it looks like we have gone from kora to ora, and a logo contest is wide open.

This began as an "organic" system, and remains that way.  Ora has taken on a life of its own, which is what we want anyway.  The community is driving it forward in spurts.  We are now seeing more folks becoming involved.  I'm seeing some new names take the reigns of parts of Ora and drive it in creative directions.

As new ideas and directions emerge, I am modifying my own processes to fit them in to the master plan.

kind regards,
nio

Thanks nio!! Stay in the dev cocoon as long as you need There's enough to do with the distribution to keep the rest of us busy for a while!

[lexicon]

The major downfall, or at least something that I think has hurt coins and communities, is the process taking toooooo looooong at each step.

I see it in NEM and NODE. They have lost a lot of community members that were at one point very involved. Then new comers show up and they contribute for awhile until they get sick of of the waiting.

If Ora can stay on a steady pace and pick up ACTIVE members and NOT lose them along the way this would make Ora fairly powerful.

My advice is to keep things moving. Regular updates with where we were, were we are at now, and where we are going next, and in the future.

Like now, what have we done, and what are we doing now.

something like

kora started, had ipo of whatever we call it, nico came, changed to ora, now were doing logo, x y and z is next.

Lets keep this thing from stalling, that happens to all coins, but if we can stay on top of trying to make sure this doesnt' happen would be good.

[jshow5555]

@nioccoin

If you have to use somebody else’s code, which in itself is something I am not 100% sure you should do, why not use the best one available. As of today it seems to be Bitshares (i.e. DPOS). Just check and make your own decision, but this are my 2c.

[Kora]

The major downfall, or at least something that I think has hurt coins and communities, is the process taking toooooo looooong at each step.

I see it in NEM and NODE. They have lost a lot of community members that were at one point very involved. Then new comers show up and they contribute for awhile until they get sick of of the waiting.

If Ora can stay on a steady pace and pick up ACTIVE members and NOT lose them along the way this would make Ora fairly powerful.

My advice is to keep things moving. Regular updates with where we were, were we are at now, and where we are going next, and in the future.

Like now, what have we done, and what are we doing now.

something like

kora started, had ipo of whatever we call it, nico came, changed to ora, now were doing logo, x y and z is next.

Lets keep this thing from stalling, that happens to all coins, but if we can stay on top of trying to make sure this doesnt' happen would be good.

Some good suggestions here, thanks! I think communication is a vital component for ORA, and if anyone wants to step up and start performing that duty, jump right in

I probably have a slightly different take on the time horizon for projects though, as I am a firm believer that quality outcomes usually take time. The cycle of plan, organise resources, execute, get feedback, re-evaluate ... then repeat ... often needs many iterations until you get a good outcome. If during those cycles there is no communication then people can sometimes start to assume nothing is happening, and then critics pop up screaming scam and/or vaporware.

For me the key is to keep the communication flowing, but don't cut corners for the sake of getting something out too early to keep people happy.

If I look at the current crypto scene I can think of some high quality projects that set deadlines, and didn't meet them, and they've suffered perception problems as a result. eMunie is probably the best example. It's obvious to me that eMunie is a serious competitor to bitcoin, NXT, ethereum, bitshares, mastercoin, counterparty etc etc, but the eMunie team originally gave an impression that they were really close to launching in Feb 2014, but that was too optimistic, and they copped a lot of scam & vaporware flak. The good thing is they learnt their lesson and they've been beavering away in private now for months. When they reappear they'll be serious competition with a quality product & professional marketing, but now they've gone to the opposite extreme and there's very little communication, even on their own forum. IMO it's better to not over promise and set deadlines, but still have regular updates to let supporters & investors know what's happening.

I know in the crypto world time moves A LOT faster, but that's not a good thing IMO, and we can resist the pressure. A good example is Slimcoin, which is a really interesting coin using proof-of-burn mining which doesn't take huge PC resources. I think the Slimcoin dev is trying hard to do something innovative and potentially very important with PoB, but he's probably got a full time job & family committments, and Slimcoin is *probably* a part-time project he does in his spare time. If you check out the Slimcoin thread the poor guy gets insulted and abused all the time for being slow with bug fixes, or for taking a while to respond to forum questions etc. We all know crypto is about "money", so a coin dev needs to respect that people who invest in their coins are going to be unhappy if they get too flakey, but sometimes I think people expect too much when it's obvious people aren't working full time on a project because they didn't have an IPO.

I guess all start-ups are hoping for enough resources to work full-time to get off the ground, but probably a lot of coin devs on this forum would be working other jobs. That's the big advantage of an IPO, but as we've chosen to go with FREE stakes and try and create value as we go to compensate people, things will take longer.

I'm not sure what the perfect dev path is for a crypto start-up. Bigger projects like ethereum or bitshares make heaps of money from their IPO's to pay lots of people to work full-time, but I think the scope for damage to the whole crypto community is massive if they fail and investors lose lots of money. I know the eEmunie dev is living off of his savings to pay for the 18+ months of dev time, but how many guys could live that long with no income? I don't think there's a perfect dev model in the unregulated crypto start up scene yet. Lots of cowboys & scammers, and obviously no regulators (which is what most of us want).


Once the dev side of things gets going I'd like to have a big focus on 'communication', and I'd be advocating for power bounties to be set aside soon to compensate whoever steps up for that roll. I like the way Monero have a periodic update posted. We could do the same.


edit: Once we have a website and maybe our own forum, communication will be a lot better. Lots of 'chicken & egg' here lol Community gets bigger when there's more stuff going on, but without lots of people pitching in & helping things progress slowly

[Yuzu]

Waiting and watching.

[Xpedite]

Just a question regarding the NXT address.
I had created a NXT wallet through mynxt.info which I asked about early in the announcement thread. The reply then was that if the address showed up in the blockchain that everything should be ok.
However, now I am realising that it is not possible to use the AE feature of NXT with the mynxt.info so how would it be possible to transfer the ORA stake with such a wallet???

Please educate me 

[ShroomsKit_Disgrace]

Just a question regarding the NXT address.
I had created a NXT wallet through mynxt.info which I asked about early in the announcement thread. The reply then was that if the address showed up in the blockchain that everything should be ok.
However, now I am realising that it is not possible to use the AE feature of NXT with the mynxt.info so how would it be possible to transfer the ORA stake with such a wallet???

Please educate me 

Just use the "official" client from here:

http://nxtra.org/nxt-wallet/

Smooth and easy client, IMH

[lexicon]

The major downfall, or at least something that I think has hurt coins and communities, is the process taking toooooo looooong at each step.

I see it in NEM and NODE. They have lost a lot of community members that were at one point very involved. Then new comers show up and they contribute for awhile until they get sick of of the waiting.

If Ora can stay on a steady pace and pick up ACTIVE members and NOT lose them along the way this would make Ora fairly powerful.

My advice is to keep things moving. Regular updates with where we were, were we are at now, and where we are going next, and in the future.

Like now, what have we done, and what are we doing now.

something like

kora started, had ipo of whatever we call it, nico came, changed to ora, now were doing logo, x y and z is next.

Lets keep this thing from stalling, that happens to all coins, but if we can stay on top of trying to make sure this doesnt' happen would be good.

Some good suggestions here, thanks! I think communication is a vital component for ORA, and if anyone wants to step up and start performing that duty, jump right in

I probably have a slightly different take on the time horizon for projects though, as I am a firm believer that quality outcomes usually take time. The cycle of plan, organise resources, execute, get feedback, re-evaluate ... then repeat ... often needs many iterations until you get a good outcome. If during those cycles there is no communication then people can sometimes start to assume nothing is happening, and then critics pop up screaming scam and/or vaporware.

For me the key is to keep the communication flowing, but don't cut corners for the sake of getting something out too early to keep people happy.

If I look at the current crypto scene I can think of some high quality projects that set deadlines, and didn't meet them, and they've suffered perception problems as a result. eMunie is probably the best example. It's obvious to me that eMunie is a serious competitor to bitcoin, NXT, ethereum, bitshares, mastercoin, counterparty etc etc, but the eMunie team originally gave an impression that they were really close to launching in Feb 2014, but that was too optimistic, and they copped a lot of scam & vaporware flak. The good thing is they learnt their lesson and they've been beavering away in private now for months. When they reappear they'll be serious competition with a quality product & professional marketing, but now they've gone to the opposite extreme and there's very little communication, even on their own forum. IMO it's better to not over promise and set deadlines, but still have regular updates to let supporters & investors know what's happening.

I know in the crypto world time moves A LOT faster, but that's not a good thing IMO, and we can resist the pressure. A good example is Slimcoin, which is a really interesting coin using proof-of-burn mining which doesn't take huge PC resources. I think the Slimcoin dev is trying hard to do something innovative and potentially very important with PoB, but he's probably got a full time job & family committments, and Slimcoin is *probably* a part-time project he does in his spare time. If you check out the Slimcoin thread the poor guy gets insulted and abused all the time for being slow with bug fixes, or for taking a while to respond to forum questions etc. We all know crypto is about "money", so a coin dev needs to respect that people who invest in their coins are going to be unhappy if they get too flakey, but sometimes I think people expect too much when it's obvious people aren't working full time on a project because they didn't have an IPO.

I guess all start-ups are hoping for enough resources to work full-time to get off the ground, but probably a lot of coin devs on this forum would be working other jobs. That's the big advantage of an IPO, but as we've chosen to go with FREE stakes and try and create value as we go to compensate people, things will take longer.

I'm not sure what the perfect dev path is for a crypto start-up. Bigger projects like ethereum or bitshares make heaps of money from their IPO's to pay lots of people to work full-time, but I think the scope for damage to the whole crypto community is massive if they fail and investors lose lots of money. I know the eEmunie dev is living off of his savings to pay for the 18+ months of dev time, but how many guys could live that long with no income? I don't think there's a perfect dev model in the unregulated crypto start up scene yet. Lots of cowboys & scammers, and obviously no regulators (which is what most of us want).


Once the dev side of things gets going I'd like to have a big focus on 'communication', and I'd be advocating for power bounties to be set aside soon to compensate whoever steps up for that roll. I like the way Monero have a periodic update posted. We could do the same.


edit: Once we have a website and maybe our own forum, communication will be a lot better. Lots of 'chicken & egg' here lol Community gets bigger when there's more stuff going on, but without lots of people pitching in & helping things progress slowly

Less interest equals less value, especially a coin like this. You might just want to be careful what your wishing for with this outlook.

Moving too slow is killing a lot of communities. Your trying to build one admitting that your willing to accept this tradeoff.

And just because things move at a steady pace, doesn't mean quality has to be sacrificed. Organization, and yes communication, can accomplish this.

What are the bottlenecks now? How do we solve them? What is the status of development tech wise? If you keep things moving you will gain momentum that your competitors lack. Quality doesn't have to be sacrificed.

Things just cant stall. Rinse and repeat too many times, doesn't leave you with gold around here. But also, I am not speaking of haste.

As for communicaton, I would have links to every thread on the front page of every thread.

Great job so far, btw, I am excited. And I'm not a stakeholder. Nor do I think, at this point, should you be giving away free ones anymore. I'll be happy to buy one at an auction, or purchase one from someone else. Value. You already have value, with the addition of Nico, and the integrity of the distribution. Giving them away again, well, that would be suicide at this point.

[Mac Red]

We got an interesting suggestion in the main topic:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=620518.msg8053222#msg8053222

What do you guys and nio think of this? Sounds like a pretty nice idea IMO.

[gvans]

We got an interesting suggestion in the main topic:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=620518.msg8053222#msg8053222

What do you guys and nio think of this? Sounds like a pretty nice idea IMO.

I'm not familiar with Bitshares but it's another POS system afaik. Anyhow was just going to give another idea what to do with the leftover stakes instead of just distributing them to current stakeholders. There must be more effective ways to make use of them than just throw them out to be holded or traded.

Fimk (based on nxt) has a good working model imo. They introduced Extra POS rewards, i.e. every block has a good reward and big amount from genesis block is distributed to those who keep their wallets running and the network healthy. Now I'm only a small fish in nxt and fimk but I really do keep my fimk wallet running 24/7 to make the most of the extra pos rewards which totally is not the case with my nxt-wallet with tiny little bit of nxt I only could make from POS-forging.

Take a look: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=633304.0

So maybe you could use the majority of leftovers for extra POS rewards. It's a fine distribution model. Still a smaller free secondary distribution could be launched later on to get more people involved, but I'd recommend those stakes to be way smaller stakes than the current distributed ones. Why? Because if the second round is 1 to 1 with the first one that would only make the current holders to create sockpuppets to acquire more Ora. Maybe 1/20 of current stakes could be the size of a stake in the second round of distribution (more like an email-giveaway or national airdrop-size). And that secondary distribution should take place after a good while when Ora has gained more credibility. At least after delivering a good white paper and webpage, preferably after launch maybe.

edit: also the possibility of another round of free big stakes would dig the ground under current trading of stakes in nxt-ae naturally so it must be carefully calculated, I just picked that 1/20 stake randomly

[DarkhorseofNxt]

Hey nioccoin, when can we expect to see a blueprint of your proposal or idea. Would love to see this moving. Are we planning to copy qora or moving into a different direction?

[megashira1]

We have everything QORA ever wanted. Good distribution and good community. We now only need what they have, good dev and good code. 

[Pentamon]

Anyhow was just going to give another idea what to do with the leftover stakes instead of just distributing them to current stakeholders. There must be more effective ways to make use of them than just throw them out to be holded or traded.

Fimk (based on nxt) has a good working model imo. They introduced Extra POS rewards, i.e. every block has a good reward and big amount from genesis block is distributed to those who keep their wallets running and the network healthy. Now I'm only a small fish in nxt and fimk but I really do keep my fimk wallet running 24/7 to make the most of the extra pos rewards which totally is not the case with my nxt-wallet with tiny little bit of nxt I only could make from POS-forging.

Take a look: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=633304.0

So maybe you could use the majority of leftovers for extra POS rewards.

+2880

I'm always forging w/my FIMK, not with my NXT.   Block rewards are a great incentive for stake participation.  My vote for extra distribution of extra stake would have to go towards substantial forging rewards.

I have to agree with you guys.
I have a similar experience, comparing NXT, NFD with NHZ (New Horizon) - the nightly deposits coming in because I run the server all the time, sure makes me smile looking at the NHZ screen, (which is also  clone of NXT).   This is encouraging, even though I own only little amount. I will have to try FIMK, based upon your description here.

Interesting how things are going.
Kudos to the devs, so far.

Pentamon

[laura@@]

I have some ideas.

1.  i remember that BM said he prefer clone bts by himself compared of be cloned by other people.

is it possible that we join 3i as one of their DAC project.  and use the undistributed coins(350M) to agser and ptser.

2. i also have another idea, we can also launch multiple projects. for example, separate 350M of ora to 10 dev teams and each of them will clone one of the popular&main steam coin.    all these projects will honor the position of orz, just like how pts and ags works.
orz will become a clone franchise focus on low end market

[jeniferqueen0409]

When will nioccoin online?
And when will we see a blueprint of his proposal or idea?

[nioccoin]

@nioccoin

If you have to use somebody else’s code, which in itself is something I am not 100% sure you should do, why not use the best one available. As of today it seems to be Bitshares (i.e. DPOS). Just check and make your own decision, but this are my 2c.

We will likely evaluate all of the contenders on their merits.  It is not uncommon to treat modern software engineering like a buffet line.  Ora could borrow any number of lines of code from any number of sources.

I realize that some ppl are skittish about not being original with code.  But in crypto, originality is the kiss of death.  You are better off sticking with well-known and widely-used algos and best practices.  Why?  Because anything "new" needs years of abuse before it can truly be trusted.  Even then, reality gets in a few good licks, like recently happened with heartbleed.

I'm not suggesting that any of these potential clone bases for Ora is using some fresh and original crypto algorithm, because if they are I will steer us away.  I'm merely using this idea to make a finer point, and that is that copying is not always a bad thing, and originality is not always a good thing.  I suspect our final version will be some hybrid of original code and cloned code, probably from multiple sources.

kind regards,
nio

[nioccoin]

The major downfall, or at least something that I think has hurt coins and communities, is the process taking toooooo looooong at each step.

I see it in NEM and NODE. They have lost a lot of community members that were at one point very involved. Then new comers show up and they contribute for awhile until they get sick of of the waiting.

Thanks for your thoughtful comment.

I'd like to agree with you, but I don't, because I question the premise that ppl leave because they get sick of waiting.  That is certainly one reason, and not unfounded.  But there are many reasons why ppl leave a coin, including a new opportunity.  We've all done it.  Most ppl reading this have dropped their bags - even at a loss - to pursue a new coin with a new idea or approach.  Not to say that they didn't get tired of waiting.

I would also like to point out that it is human nature to become impatient with progress, or lack thereof.  But most ppl have no experience of what it is like on the inside of the problem domain.  Everything seems simple, but reality intrudes.  Even shoddy development is immensely complex.  But great development is even more difficult and time-consuming, because by its nature great dev is extensible and scalable.  What scalable means in laymans terms is Ora needs to be capable of being a small crypto system with a small user base, all the way to a worldwide crypto system with billions of users, without causing performance and other issues.  As for extensibility, it needs to be capable of being extended without breaking existing functionality.  That takes careful planning, which in turn takes time.

If Ora can stay on a steady pace and pick up ACTIVE members and NOT lose them along the way this would make Ora fairly powerful.

Almost every complaint I've ever read about a coin comes down to profit.  Ppl want to make money off crypto, and to make money they need to buy low and sell high.  That process is complicated by the coin fundamentals, and the coin development speed.  That's not so different than a tech company promising to release the next big gizmo, in the hopes that they will sell a billion of them.  Even then, the share holders make their own decisions about the viability of the gizmo, or its colour or its capabilities, and sell off or buy in based on those ideas.  They enter or exit based on their assumptions, and those assumptions may be grotesquely wrong, leading to ruin.  Or they could be right, leading to fortune.  Or, they could ride along for years in a sideways market.

I don't dispute the importance of momentum.  However, I don't want to fool myself into thinking that we have that sort of control or power.  Ppl use cryptocurrencies for different purposes.  Some are fanboys, some are institutional investors, and some are swing traders.  Some think that a portion of crypto users are governments trying to swing the free currency movement one way or another in order to corrupt or kill it.
This is a revolving door, and ppl come and go as they see fit, or as Adam Smith would say, as it suits their motive for gain.  That gain is usually but not always monetary.  Some ppl who bought BTC at 5 cents and sold at a dollar thought they made a fortune.  They exited and made very good on their investment.  Others held out and were rewarded with a 900 USD sell, a phenomenal gain.  All of this took three or four years, during which BTC was routinely hyped and disparaged for any number of reasons.  Ppl got upset and fled, and others took their place.

My point is, I fully expect ppl to get off the bus, and those same ppl I fully expect to get back on when the bus comes around again, or when the bus has a better paint job and new mechanicals.  That is Ora.  Those who are not satisfied with baby steps may be inclined to get off the bus and wait until the price goes up again.  Look at all the coins out there.  The most volume is when the coin gets really hot or really cold.  When it's hot, the bulls push the bears into selling high.  When it is cold, the bears pound the bulls into dumping into the floor.  Everyone wants to cheer for the winning team.

Ora, like all other coins, will have its fair-weather fans, who latch on when Ora's growth curve is positive, and get out when things look bleak.  Or, when they need money.  Or any number of reasons.

My advice is to keep things moving. Regular updates with where we were, were we are at now, and where we are going next, and in the future.

We are committed to doing what we can, but not necessarily toward an end that you are expecting.  If I could summarize the theoretical underpinning of Ora, I would have to say: "an overnight success takes a decade of hard work."  Ora is here for the long haul, to build quality.  Quality attracts success.

The ultimate prize in this business is becoming the de-facto e-currency for a new era of money that is not centrally controlled.  That is what all of the serious contenders are vying for.  Some would argue that BTC is already positioned for that.  I'm not convinced.  Lots of 800-kg gorillas have been dethroned by underdogs.  BTC is vulnerable not because it is a bad system, though I see some real problems with it;  BTC is vulnerable for the simple reason that it is the top dog, and eventually one of the hundreds of little dogs nipping at its heels will cause it to stumble and perhaps even crash and burn.

kind regards,
nio

[nioccoin]

If we do end up giving the original stakeholders a top up from the left over stakes I think our only option is to use the original stakeholder list. If somebody chose to sell their stake early it doesn't change the fact that they were an original stakeholder. If a non-stakeholder buys a lot of ORA assets before the vote it doesn't change the fact that they weren't an original stakeholder.

My understanding of the NXT voting system is ALL ORA asset holders would be eligible to vote, even people who weren't original stakeholders but bought ORA on the NXT AE from early sellers.

It would be nice to be able to vote asap, but we don't have any control over when the NXT voting system goes live.

Bytemaster says he can help you clone btsx, whether to consider cloning btsx it?

I think it would be more valuable.

My personal opinion would be guided heavily by the attitude of our lead dev, nioccoin, but I must admit this option does sound like a very interesting avenue to explore!!

DEV,You should consider clone BTS not QORA
1.BTS use C++,it's better than java
2.We don't know when and how will QORA release the resources
3.We have a strong community and BTS have a long term development map.this is win-win
4.In my opnion,BTS is better than QORA

Thanks for your input.

1.  I never wanted to clone Qora for the reason that the native JVM has known issues with real-time data.  I prefer C++ over Java, but could do either.
2.  Yes, Qora's open source timeline is fraught with issues.  Besides the unknown release date, there is a break-in period during which devs tear the code apart looking for security issues and other problems.  That could take days or weeks.  Once the code is OS'd, the blackhats will have their turn to rip it to shreds and sink the ship.  I'm not a fan of closed source in the crypto space, but I understand the motivation to keep the IP close to the devs for a little while anyway.

This brings up an interesting discussion which is: presuming Ora brings some fantastic innovation to the table, what would the community prefer to do with that innovation?
a) Keep the intellectual property closed, thereby protecting the IP.
b)  Keep the IP closed for a short while, thereby protecting the IP until Ora is too far ahead for copycats to catch up to it.
c)  Open it up for all to see (and copy with abandon), thereby risking Ora's innovation right at the start (or strengthening its innovation by subjecting the code to strenuous public review).


As for what to use for a clone, presuming we don't write it from scratch, I'm not sold out on BTS or any other coin base to clone at this point.  But since you brought it up, what do you see that makes BTS better, or the best coin to clone?

[DarkhorseofNxt]

A good comparison chart between bts qora would be nice.