Topic: Bitminter bitcoin mining pool - shutdown mining 2020-07-01 website 2021-06-01 - page 79. (Read 324661 times)

I just wanted to mention (found by reading organofcorti.blogspot.com)
that for the last 50 days our luck is 30-50% more than the average,
meaning in this pool we get (by luck) more than our hashrate deserves.

And I'm happy with that 

I look at shifts and blocks and I don't really understand it.  Right now the last ten shifts say "Paying Now" under shifts, but it's been saying that for the past few blocks found and nothing has been paid.  Now this might be totally normal, the problem is, I have no idea.  Am I being paid for the work I'm doing?  It's really weird.

As another poster has mentioned, looking at transaction history only provides you with a good idea of the payout on the next block if there are no major changes in hash (personal or pool) before it's solved.

A user interface suggestion would be to bring that number back with a note that reads "What's this?" People would click on it which produces a pop-up with your explanation of what that number means including a note about shifts and maybe a link in the pop-up to more information about how your payout system works. You had a brief explanation before when you hovered over the title. Most people may not have known to hover over the title, whereas a "What's this?" link would stand out better. Plus, you have more room for an explanation in a traditional pop-up, then the hover over.

The default landing page after logging in could be called "Account Overview" or "Account at Glance." It would include bringing back the expected payout per block along with the other information that's there now. An overview of your current hash rate and your last few shifts that's on the expanded stats page would be useful on this page.  I would recommend showing the last few blocks solved (with your payout for those blocks) and the time since last block solved with a note that you only get paid when a block is solved, not when shifts are completed.

After Logging In, I go mostly to the Live stats page. I used to use the expected payout but that is gone, which I understand. I think it would make sense adding to the blocks section on the live stats page, the payments received/expected for completed block. Then color coding it for unconfirmed/stale/ect. This would save going to the blocks page to see which is confirmed, and at the same time, saves going to transaction page to see payment for last few blocks. P.S. I really like that it shows your current rank for those of us not in top 50, and wouldn't mind access somewhere to a complete rank list for those of us that like seeing ourselves move up lists.

I do really like the setup how it is though, and have been thrilled with ease of use. 

I too liked the estimated pay per block for the two main reasons given: 1) I used it as a single-number indicator of how my equipment and the pool were doing - if it changed much, I looked into why, and 2) I used it as an indicator of how many more blocks needed to be found to reach my auto payout setting.  I would vote to have it as an option to turn it on. To be honest, I don't understand how it led to any problems.  I am also convinced that whatever you change it to (like the current pay/Hour stat on the shifts page) there is still going to be a group of people who don't understand it or are bothered by what it shows (such as "unpaid" shifts). I believe it is impossible to please everyone in this situation: there will always be people who don't think they are being paid enough or have unpaid shifts or   Too many people just don't understand that finding a block is a random event and all the stats in the world won't change that.

I like the suggestion of a graph of my recent hashing history as that would be another good way to check on my equipment over the medium term (perhaps 10 or 20 shifts).  Seeing my current hashing power without having to bring up a stats page would be good too.  On that note, having the pool hash rate being the first thing that comes up when using the "Live Stats Pop Up" seems redundant since it is on the top of every page including the one I just clicked on the link from.  A more useful first page would be either the "Me" or "Round" tab, both of which contain my current hashing power.

I generally always leave the "Blocks" page open and refresh it whenever it occurs to me to do so. This is a simple way to see if new blocks have been found and to watch the confirmations count down for found blocks.  It would be nice if this page had the current UTC time, or even better, the current length of the current round (or best of all, both). 

I suppose the "Live Stats, full size" contains everything I want (except the number of confirmations on recent blocks), but the layout means what I am looking for requires scrolling. I'd like the "Current Round", "Latest Blocks", and "Latest Shifts" side by side without anything else as I'm either not interested (Fastest Users) or it is already shown in the Current Round (Total Comp. Power, Your Comp. Power, Workers).

As someone else suggested, maybe a customizable layout is the only way to satisfy everyone.

Overall though, things are good and the pool runs well which is what really matters.  Thanks for your effort to always improve things.

Doc, given your looking for feedback/ideas … here’s my wish list:

1) Once logged in it would be great so see the ‘Live Stats Full Size’ screen plus 'Balance', 'Unconfirmed', 'Future'.

Sorry to mention another pool, but eleuthria has done a good job when you login ... earnings, speed (both pool and personally), along with shifts and block earnings are all available. Scroll down and you also get a feel for how your workers are doing.

2) It would be good to see how our miners/workers are performing in a graph format. 24hr/48hr/1 week. This makes it easy to see their performance over time. The current ‘workers’ tab doesn’t allow this information to be tracked.

Many people host their kit these days, and not all hosting companies allow direct internet access … so it feels like you mine in the dark. Even if you do have access, the readings are only an indication … it’s what the pool is accepting that really matters.

For example, I have a SP30 that has been troublesome, and can’t access it directly …. So I was forced to point it to a site where I could get good graphical information over time as to how it was performing.

Just my two cents worth ...


PS: I liked the expected payout per future block which got removed ... but understand why you did it 

I like what cenicsoft had said as well.

For me, when I log in, I typically go to two areas... The main account page, where I would reference the "expected pay per block" and the live stats.  As I noted previously, that is a single number that gave me a snapshot of how things were going for me, relative to the pool hash rate, based on my own hash rate, over the last 10 shifts.

If it is confusing to some people, I'm not sure how; however, for me, it was very useful.  Nowadays, with big hash rates coming and going, individual miner scores may vary from shift to shift, so this gives a one number snapshot of my status.  Also, is I add or modify my equipment, I get an idea of my FUTURE earnings in Bitcoin, based on the current pool hash rate.  

Transaction history only tells me what has already happened. If we are in the middle of a difficult block, as the pool hash rate goes up and down, I have to look at my scores the latest 10 shifts to estimate that number.

If you think it should be an optional setting to bring this back, I would support that, but please reconsider bringing this value back.  

I'm still assessing as to whether the changes to shift history is useful for me. It's okay, but not thrilling for me.

As for shift length, I like the shorter shifts.  12-14 hours per shift was just getting too long...

A graphic of each miner's hash rate over the last 10 shifts would be useful with a precision of 1 minute. Where I mine for LiteCoin has that (give-me-coins) over last 24 hours and they do provide a "Round estimate" value which is similar to be expected per block!😉

Finally, something to think about might be to ultimately use responsive UI design for the website... I'm sure many of use smartphones and tablets to view stats on bitminter.com.  But I would consider that a lower priority as it does look fine on my iPhone and iPad.

I never go into the history to be honest, I went there a few time to satisfy my curiosity on how much the fees was taken from my coins

I have always two page open at Btiminter, the main page for account balance and the live stats to monitor the pool and myself.


A big yes from me


As I said previously, I check my balance, the live stats and if I finally found a ***** block  I would say that the live stats page is the one i'm looking like at 90% of the time.

I also look the block page to see how many confirmation are left before getting pay or if a block would be Stale or Orphan.

I consult the shift page once in while pretty much in way of looking into the history of what happen recently or in the past.

Then come the the Luck and Reward page. (rarely)

I hope it gives you an idea of what you could add in the main page

Thanks Doc

Is the transaction history ok for this? Maybe a link or button on the first page after login would be faster than having to go through the menu at the top?

I was doing the same thing. I would knew how many blocks (plus minus 1) I needed to reach my cash out.

I don't have an answer that makes economic sense, other than luck chasing, but it seems that last week was quite good for those leasing their mining equipment.  I have my two S3+'s running through LeaseRig (they provide what they call LR3, a proxy that lets me get some reporting for my own mining and then can instantly switch to a renter's pools with no intervention on my end) and last week we had almost every rig rented.  My 900GH kept getting picked up in 1h increments by two different renters (one kept paying in DOGE, the other in LTC) - as soon as it would come off lease, the other would pick it up. Neither stayed at the same pools for too long, I saw the pool settings change several times.

Then suddenly, it stopped and renting went back to normal.  As I look now, 25/45 of the rigs are rented out.

Doc, don't know if it's easy to add, but I like the performance chart they have.  Would be neat to have something similar when mining directly.

https://i.imgur.com/aFwPQ5Ql.png

It's been 1 day 7.5 hours since the last block was found. You get paid when blocks are found. Sometimes we find the next block quickly, other times it takes longer. There's some further details on the payouts here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2769824


That's the proportional reward system. It was very popular in the early days of mining pools until pool hopping was invented. Pool hoppers would abuse this reward system to get more than their fair share - resulting in 24/7 miners getting less than fair pay. You can read more about pool hopping here: http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/5072/what-is-pool-hopping - the top answer is by Meni Rosenfeld who literally wrote the book on pool reward systems.

cenicsoft, thanks a lot for that post. That gives me some food for thought.

The two parts of the website I am most unhappy with are the front page and the account details page which you get right after login.

What should be on the page after login?

Seeing how your own mining is gong makes a lot of sense. Perhaps instead of the pay per block some info on your hashrate could do the job? Maybe a small graph of your hashrate over recent shifts, as well as your current live hashrate? A lot of people like to watch the pool hashrate as well. It's already displayed at the top of every page, but it could be shown in the same graph as well.

Keeping the account balance is probably good too.

How many blocks do we need to find before you get X coins which you want to spend on something? Ok, I can see that this is something many would want. It's difficult to do that without getting all the confusion I was trying to put an end to. Perhaps the optional display you mentioned is a solution. I also have to explain to people several times per day that they get paid when blocks are found, not when shifts are finished. Obviously the website is confusing in this regard. I would like the website to make this fact obvious: "when blocks come in, coins come in". I'm not sure how best to do that, and I want to avoid the focus on how much you get per block and all the confusion that ensues.

To anyone using Bitminter: after you log in what do you most often need? Not necessarily exact numbers or buttons, but what you'd use them for.

I don't know why, but the calculator on westhash and nicehash won't do it.

I put in what i needed to put in and not talking about the bitminter part but what i was willing to pay that part. Did not see how long i could mine. To bad, hope to use it in the future.

That is an interesting idea.  Doc could you not actually just make the shift length equal to the block? or last 2 blocks or 5 to reduce variance.

Then all work would be paid period.

Just a question.


Fahlcor

I personally don't see the point behind having shifts at all.  We find a coin, we get paid.  I don't see any sort of delay.  The amount I get paid is based on the amount of hash I do over the length of the coin.  If someone jumped on and put 500,000 hash into the pool for a day, all it would mean to me is I'd get paid a little less because of the hash jump and as soon as person left, I'd be back to normal.  Inbound jumpers to me only means we'll get that BTC a little faster then when they were elsewhere.

doc or anyone who can help.
Just added a couple of s3 and having a problem.
my balance is  stuck at zero even after a day.
I  am using  US2.bitminter.com and the status on the antminer is alive.

Thanks for the help.

I used it a couple of ways. When it was one of the first things to see when logging in, I could tell if there had been a sudden change in anything - new hash added to the site, a worker offline that I didn't know about, etc.  I don't pool hop and since it was usually consistent or would only vary slightly, having it was used as a trigger that something changed.

The second way I used it was to estimate how long to hit a certain goal. yes, I could use a mining calculator for that. This made it easier since I knew how many blocks would need to be solved in order to earn a certain amount specifically at Bitminer.  Most mining calculators base earnings off hash rate estimates over time, not earnings per block.  This was a nice way of looking at it from a different perspective. Plus, I didn't have to go to a different website to check a calculator!

Maybe you can enable it as a preference with it off by default. Those that were confused by it, would never know. Those that liked it could have it back.

A note on the longer shifts - it was nice for those of us who had been around for some time because when someone brought a bunch of hash suddenly and you got a nice string of blocks solved, your older work suddenly was more lucky.  Newer work suffered, but then with people adding then dropping hash, slower miners got a boost, while the hoppers were discouraged.  If no blocks were solved in a 13 hour shift, then 3 in the second 13 hours, you'd see a huge impact on earnings and your per block earnings would be very high. Now, in 13 hours, that's 4 shifts gone by and the higher hash rate would drop your earnings per block solved significantly.

The opposite would then happen. When those people left, your earnings per block would be down as they continued to get paid for previous shifts. The difference was that when those people left, there would be three or four days between blocks being solved and their work would mostly be gone with your earnings per block back to where they were before anything happened. Bad for high hash rate hoppers, good for everyone else.

I do see the logic in shorter shifts though in the fact that it seems to be attracting an overall higher hash rate to make earnings more consistent. I didn't mind the inconsistency though since you could have some killer days and then other days that would kill you! 

Thanks Doc, understood.