Most Popular
1500 questions
50
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5 answers
How do you get a Bitcoin Public Key from a Private Key
How do I, in extreme specificity, convert a given private bitcoin key into a public bitcoin key (Talk to me like I'm 5 and I have to do this step by step or the evil witch will cook me alive in her oven). NOT where can I find a program that will do…
Mine
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48
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4 answers
ECDSA: (v, r, s), what is v?
Deterministically signing a Tx with RFC6979 returns v, r, s, where r and s are the 2 values used in standard ECDSA signatures. v = 27 + (y % 2), so 27 + the parity of r, as pybitcointools indicates.
So for even r, we get v = 27, odd r we get v =…
Wizard Of Ozzie
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48
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4 answers
What are multi-signature transactions?
What are multi-signature transactions, and why might they be used?
Also see:
How does one make multisignature transactions with the bitcoin client?
How can I create a multi signature 2-of-3 transaction?
Highly Irregular
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47
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6 answers
Why is downloading blocks taking longer and longer?
First off, this really needs to get fixed. I'm downloading blocks for at least 8 hours now, and it's still not done. I know the problem of having to download the entire block chain is being worked on, but I feel it's already out of hand. Setting up…
Luc
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47
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8 answers
How long would it take a large computer to crack a private key?
I am doing a presentation on Bitcoins and I was looking for some calculations to make people feel safe about the private key encryption. Please first answer, how long in bytes the private key is, then how many combinations of numbers it will…
shoeless joe
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47
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4 answers
How can I accept Bitcoin donations on my blog or site?
If I sell things, there are many services that allow me to accept bitcoins as payment. But for those who simply want to accept bitcoins on their blog or other site ... as donations.
A simple bitcoin address can be listed but what other options are…
Stephen Gornick
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47
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3 answers
How does the bitcoin client make the initial connection to the bitcoin network?
Once the bitcoin client is connected to a machine (or multiple machines) on the bitcoin network, they can share information (e.g. the block-chain, IP addresses of other nodes, etc). I understand how this peer-to-peer architecture is robust to nodes…
Ciaran
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47
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8 answers
Where are the user's bitcoins actually stored?
On the person's computer?
On bitcoin.org? :)
Where does that information reside that tells others and me how much bitcoins I have?
I assume it can't be on my PC because I could easily hack the file that contains that data and get myself more…
Alex
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47
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2 answers
What prevents a pool miner from stealing an entire block?
As I understand it,when mining BTC, and calculating a block, the goal is to find a SHA-256 hash below a certain value (with the previous block, a nonce, and other things as the input). Are pool miners all performing that calculation directly (just…
Jonathon Reinhart
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46
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1 answer
ELI5: What's the difference between a child-key and a hardened child-key in BIP32
I've read BIP32, and I do understand it more or less.
Could someone please explain to me like I'm 5 years old what the difference between a child-key and a hardened child-key is?
I'm trying to add HD wallet generation to a service I'm building. I…
Amin Shah Gilani
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3 answers
Why can’t the genesis block coinbase be spent?
According to the bitcoin wiki:
The first 50BTC block reward went to address 1A1zP1eP5QGefi2DMPTfTL5SLmv7DivfNa, though this reward can't be spent due to a quirk in the way that the genesis block is expressed in the code (this may have been…
Nick ODell
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45
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2 answers
How do I import a private key into Bitcoin-Core?
How do I import a private key into Bitcoin-Qt? bitcoind is nowhere to be found, and pywallet says it requires "bsddb" when I run it, which is also nowhere to be found. I generated some vanity addresses and I want to use them.
lurf jurv
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45
votes
1 answer
How does Bitcoin Cash implement replay protection?
Bitcoin Cash says that they are providing replay protection for their fork. How does this replay protection work?
Murch
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45
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10 answers
How to unstuck a low-fee transaction with blockchain.info?
I've sent a transaction from blockchain.info, but accidentally included too little fee. What can I do to cancel the transaction or speed up the transaction's confirmation?
This is a complementary question to Why is my transaction not getting…
Murch
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45
votes
4 answers
How do I see the IP address of a bitcoin transaction?
How do I see the IP address that someone used to send or receive bitcoins with? Is it stored in the blockchain?
lemonginger
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