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A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

karpathy.github.io

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Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#171

Post by uncletammy »

tsimionescu wrote: post #105
exit wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

segwit facilitates the construction of lightning channels. taproot, which recently locked in, reduces the space needed to represent complex contracts. moreover, bitcoin aims at being a concise and focused base layer on top of which secondary layers and sidechains can be built. your absolute statement "exactly zero" is absolutely wrong.

> moreover, bitcoin aims at being a concise and focused base layer on top of which secondary layers and sidechains can be built. Have you ever read the white paper that outlines what bitcoin aims to be?

> Have you ever read the white paper that outlines what bitcoin aims to be?

... or even the title

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#172

Post by uncletammy »

iamastrangeloop wrote: post #113
noxer wrote: post #61

"...Bitcoin is a living, breathing, developing code base that is moving forward with new features to continue to scale..." There is exactly zero progress to make it scale in the last 10+ years.

There has been great progress in scaling the original protocol through the Bitcoin SV implementation: - Transaction fees are ~$0.0001 - The network has shown capacity for 50k tps - On March 14, 2021, the network processed a world record 638 MB block - As of June 4, 2021 the chain size exceeded that of the BTC implementation and is currently 418.17 GB - New business based on micropayments have emerged like twetch, str…

There has been great progress in scaling on just about every other cryptocurrency, including many flavours of bitcoin. BTC is the only coin who finds scaling too difficult.

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#175

Post by wyager »

simias wrote: post #89
wyager wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taproot decreases the size of multisig and other complex transactions significantly, in the happy path of a cooperative signature. It also enables Schnorr, which produces smaller signatures than ECDSA. It also contains features to further improve the efficiency of Lightning, which is a shockingly effective scaling mechanism.

Lightning doesn't work because it either leads to a chaos of routing that doesn't scale or it ends up centralized and you lose the point of bitcoin in the first step. And don't bother coming up with hand wavy explanations of how it could work, some day . People have been talking about Lightning for years, literally billions of dollars have been poured into the "tech", the fact that even bitcoin enthusiasts barely eve…

Your entire premise is based on nonsense. People use lightning all the time and it works great.

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#176

Post by wyager »

normac2 wrote: post #123
noxer wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Daily reminder that cryptocurrencies are not == bitcoin All the problems with bitcoin are long long solved just not with bitcoin because its not possible to fix something when the majority (of hashpower) thinks its not broken or rather profit form its brokenness. FBA coins exists since 2013 or so.

Would you include environmental impact as a solved problem? My understanding is that Proof of Stake is the best serious option and that it's very controversial if it'll work.

Proof of stake lacks the security properties of proof of work, e.g. via grinding attacks.

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#177

Post by iamastrangeloop »

noxer wrote: post #163
iamastrangeloop wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The protocol remains the original and it scales significantly. I'd focus on protocol not people. If people changed the protocol then it's no longer bitcoin. Twetch.app has more than 50k users. It's also a genuine use case. So is etched.page or the other above-mentioned services. How can you abuse storage if there is a 0.5 satoshis/byte fee to write data on chain currently? Miners are for-profit entities and will alwa…

You completely ignore my points so I will yours Have a nice day

Which point specifically?

You claim centralized manipulation of bitcoin and fraudulent people while the protocol hasn't changed. Do you have legal evidence?

Also you claim price speculation as the only use case while I've listed several apps with real users.

You mention storage abuse and I argue that miner fees prevent that.

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#178

Post by wyager »

noxer wrote: post #106
simias wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lightning doesn't work because it either leads to a chaos of routing that doesn't scale or it ends up centralized and you lose the point of bitcoin in the first step. And don't bother coming up with hand wavy explanations of how it could work, some day . People have been talking about Lightning for years, literally billions of dollars have been poured into the "tech", the fact that even bitcoin enthusiasts barely eve…

Daily reminder that cryptocurrencies are not == bitcoin All the problems with bitcoin are long long solved just not with bitcoin because its not possible to fix something when the majority (of hashpower) thinks its not broken or rather profit form its brokenness. FBA coins exists since 2013 or so.

FBA is centralized. Period. There’s a reason ripple hasn’t dominated the secure payments industry.

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#179

Post by rantwasp »

animex wrote: post #60
msgilligan wrote: post #57

This is reminds me of Ken Shirriff's 2014 "Bitcoins the Hard Way" blog post that also used Python to build a Bitcoin transaction from scratch: http://www.righto.com/2014/02/bitcoins-hard-way-using-raw-bi... (The subtitle of the blog is "Computer history, restoring vintage computers, IC reverse engineering, and whatever" and it is full of fascinating articles, several of which have been featured here on HN)

No, the hardest way is using pencil and paper to mine a block :) https://gizmodo.com/mining-bitcoin-with-pencil-and-paper-164...

technically it said “the hard way” not “the hardest way”. also, computing a hash != mining. mining needs forming the block and computing the hash

Re: A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python

#180

Post by uncletammy »

wyager wrote: post #65
noxer wrote: post #61

"...Bitcoin is a living, breathing, developing code base that is moving forward with new features to continue to scale..." There is exactly zero progress to make it scale in the last 10+ years.

> There is exactly zero progress to make it scale in the last 10+ years. Lol, literally this week: https://taproot.watch/

Oh good, BTC can finally support Schnorr signatures, a feature that been available on BCH for years now. A feature that is useless until wallet developers add Schnorr signing functionality.

Taproot is the update we get after ten years of the BTC devs doing nothing except gaslighting users about the protocol's scalability? All that momentum wasted.

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