must be late in canada
Yes it sure was... why can't we all just agree to live in one time zone and leave the rest of the planet to the more charismatic megafauna?
Anyway, we're both awake now and This Is Happening. It's turned into Lesson Four: How Confirmations Work.
We're doing it in 4 quarters, and I went first. So I'm sitting there staring at the wallet software on one screen, wondering (like any *coin noob) why the transaction doesn't even have a single confirmation yet. It's been like 5 minutes, WTF? Is it a double spend? Did all the miners go away? Who is this HunterS anyway? That was a lot of money for a joke coin with no source code, you dipstick...
You know, classic "Oh crap" panic after sending out BTC and waiting for the whole counterparty risk bit to be over with. Meanwhile I have bfgminer running on the other screen, and nothing much happening there. New blocks have slowed way down since the diff change (because that's
the whole point of a diff change).
And somewhere in my lizard brain there's that panic moment, that something's wrong, blocks are too slow AND confirmations are too slow, what are the odds of that happening at the same-- DING! Bfgminer shows a new block discovered on the network at the
exact same moment as the wallet software shows its first confirmation.
(Insert Sudden Clarity Clarence meme image here.)
Of course I know how blocks and confirmations work, whatamistupid? I've read it plenty of times. I've bought/sold/traded plenty. But seeing the stuff I take for granted in Bitcoin happen on a small chain right in front of me... priceless.
Every Comp Sci professor who wants to teach how cryptocurrencies work should start an alt for their class, have them all set up with wallets and mining software and watch it run for the whole semester.
And you don't need a Comp Sci professor to do it. Just download altcoin!
