Transaction fees magically appearing, how to account for them?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Should'nt we as the senders be able to decide what we're willing to pay for a transaction instead of it being taken from our wallets with nothing to be done about it after the fact?

That is why there is an option for this.

0.3.21 provides no way to override the transaction fee and send a free transaction (accepting the lengthy delay).

That's what I am talking about.
I had to downgrade to 0.3.20 to get around this.

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[xf2_org]

Should'nt we as the senders be able to decide what we're willing to pay for a transaction instead of it being taken from our wallets with nothing to be done about it after the fact?

That is why there is an option for this.

0.3.21 provides no way to override the transaction fee and send a free transaction (accepting the lengthy delay). Is this in 0.3.22?

Should be the default behavior.  I send free TX's with 0.3.21.  TX fee is stored in wallet, so maybe you must explicitly -paytxfee=0, to reset it?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Should'nt we as the senders be able to decide what we're willing to pay for a transaction instead of it being taken from our wallets with nothing to be done about it after the fact?

That is why there is an option for this.

0.3.21 provides no way to override the transaction fee and send a free transaction (accepting the lengthy delay). Is this in 0.3.22?

Should be the default behavior.  I send free TX's with 0.3.21.  TX fee is stored in wallet, so maybe you must explicitly -paytxfee=0, to reset it?

Still, that won't work in the GUI, which is annoying.

[error]

Should'nt we as the senders be able to decide what we're willing to pay for a transaction instead of it being taken from our wallets with nothing to be done about it after the fact?

That is why there is an option for this.

0.3.21 provides no way to override the transaction fee and send a free transaction (accepting the lengthy delay). Is this in 0.3.22?

Should be the default behavior.  I send free TX's with 0.3.21.  TX fee is stored in wallet, so maybe you must explicitly -paytxfee=0, to reset it?

You can do it from the command line, but not in the GUI, which is what most people use.

"Yes" sends with fee, "No" cancels the transaction. This dialog needs a third option, to send without fee. HOWEVER, enabling the third option should be a user preference which is disabled by default.

[sassame]

@Gavin - BTW, I'm concerned with the transaction fee size itself, not the percentage (since I'd be on the hook for the fee, should the user not have enough BTC to cover the fee in their account).  And, it was my understanding that as the size of the transfer goes up, the txn fee does, too, right?

[xf2_org]

@Gavin - BTW, I'm concerned with the transaction fee size itself, not the percentage (since I'd be on the hook for the fee, should the user not have enough BTC to cover the fee in their account).  And, it was my understanding that as the size of the transfer goes up, the txn fee does, too, right?

Fee goes up (a) as the size of the transaction increases, and (b) as the block fills up (limit 1MB).  See https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transaction_fees

[SgtSpike]

No resolution for this... I too, would like to send transactions with no fees, even if it takes a day or two before they are finally included in a block.  No way to do this though?  I am running the latest bitcoind 0.3.23.  I REALLY think it should be optional to pay a transaction fee.

[Gavin Andresen]

I don't want to keep putting band-aids on the transaction fee problem, so I'm against adding Yet Another Button to the client.

If you're impatient and can't stand the thought of paying half-a-millibitcoin for a transaction, then compile your own version of bitcoin. Just don't complain if you end up with a wallet full of 0/unconfirmed transactions that tie up all your funds.

[speeder]

I don't want to keep putting band-aids on the transaction fee problem, so I'm against adding Yet Another Button to the client.

If you're impatient and can't stand the thought of paying half-a-millibitcoin for a transaction, then compile your own version of bitcoin. Just don't complain if you end up with a wallet full of 0/unconfirmed transactions that tie up all your funds.

Good that some people are making alternative clients.

[JoelKatz]

The problem is that the client doesn't meet user expectations in three important ways.

First, the technical documentation says things like: "Transaction fees are voluntary on the part of the person making the bitcoin transaction, as the person attempting to make a transaction can include any fee or none at all in the transaction." It is highly misleading to say that this is true because the user can modify the client.

Second, the client has an option to set the transaction fee per KB to zero. This creates the user expectation that they'll never pay a transaction fee. It is not made clear that this is not the only source of transaction fees.

Third, there is no way to see ahead of time what the transaction fee is going to be. This creates problems in cases where the user is trying to ensure the recipient gets a particular number of bitcoins.

Nothing is false or incorrect, just highly misleading.

[speeder]

The problem is that the client doesn't meet user expectations in three important ways.

First, the technical documentation says things like: "Transaction fees are voluntary on the part of the person making the bitcoin transaction, as the person attempting to make a transaction can include any fee or none at all in the transaction." It is highly misleading to say that this is true because the user can modify the client.

Second, the client has an option to set the transaction fee per KB to zero. This creates the user expectation that they'll never pay a transaction fee. It is not made clear that this is not the only source of transaction fees.

Third, there is no way to see ahead of time what the transaction fee is going to be. This creates problems in cases where the user is trying to ensure the recipient gets a particular number of bitcoins.

Nothing is false or incorrect, just highly misleading.

That.

And I did not knew about the second part. (I thought transactions fees are always set per KB, they aren't?)

[JoelKatz]

(I thought transactions fees are always set per KB, they aren't?)

If they were, then if you set the transaction fee per KB to zero, you'd never pay any transaction fees. On 0.3.23, you will pay transaction fees even if you set the fee per KB to zero. How you want to interpret this is up to you. You can say the client is not honoring the fee per KB of zero. You can say the client is imposing a transaction fee that's not per KB and is honoring the fee per KB of zero. You say po-TAY-to, I say po-TAH-to.

[SgtSpike]

If transaction fees are going to be randomly enforced with no way to stop it, may as well just slap a tx fee on every tx.  Make the minimum tx fee 0.0005 BTC every time, with the option to pay more to potentially get a tx to go through faster.

But having the option to set tx fee to 0, then pay tx fees, that's just confusing, misleading, and frustrating.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

If transaction fees are going to be randomly enforced with no way to stop it, may as well just slap a tx fee on every tx.  Make the minimum tx fee 0.0005 BTC every time, with the option to pay more to potentially get a tx to go through faster.

But having the option to set tx fee to 0, then pay tx fees, that's just confusing, misleading, and frustrating.

+1

I don't want to keep putting band-aids on the transaction fee problem, so I'm against adding Yet Another Button to the client.

If you're impatient and can't stand the thought of paying half-a-millibitcoin for a transaction, then compile your own version of bitcoin. Just don't complain if you end up with a wallet full of 0/unconfirmed transactions that tie up all your funds.

Good that some people are making alternative clients.

I am starting to think seriously about maintaining a "No-Forced-TX-Fee" fork of the main client.

[SgtSpike]

Shadow, you mentioned that you downgraded to 0.3.20... is there still a link available somewhere to download a compiled version of 0.3.20?

I would 100% support a fork for a client that doesn't force transaction fees.

[TiagoTiago]

Is there really the possibility free small transactions will hang around waiting for confirmations forever? I thought transactions that were waiting for confirmations for too long automaticly gained more priority regardless of the size or even presence of tx fees....

[SgtSpike]

Is there really the possibility free small transactions will hang around waiting for confirmations forever? I thought transactions that were waiting for confirmations for too long automaticly gained more priority regardless of the size or even presence of tx fees....

They do.  Well, coins that wait around longer get priority, at any rate.

[JoelKatz]

Is there really the possibility free small transactions will hang around waiting for confirmations forever? I thought transactions that were waiting for confirmations for too long automaticly gained more priority regardless of the size or even presence of tx fees....

There is the possibility. If no miners are willing to accept a transaction, it will wait around for confirmation forever. In practice, at least for now, there are enough lulls in the transaction load and miners willing to take any transaction at all that there's not a problem.

[TiagoTiago]

Also, i thought there were some measures in place so that if due to some statistical blip a transaction stayed floating unconfirmed for too long it would be canceled, so even if all miners reject a transaction the money wouldn't stay in limbo forever...

[JoelKatz]

Also, i thought there were some measures in place so that if due to some statistical blip a transaction stayed floating unconfirmed for too long it would be canceled, so even if all miners reject a transaction the money wouldn't stay in limbo forever...

There is, by intentional design, no way to cancel a transaction, other than to get a conflicting transaction included in the hash chain. If a miner includes it in the chain, then it happens.