Topic: RAM-Reduction & Backup Center Testing (version 0.89.99.16) - page 23. (Read 41311 times)

Can you post system specs?  If others have this same problem, it would be nice to try to correlate it with specific system configurations.  I just tested it on one of my non-dev windows machines and it works.  But I also have python installed, which shouldn't matter (since this is a standalone package), but it might.   So I can half-verify it working on Windows 7-64bit with python pre-installed.

I can't seem to get it to work. This is what appears in the text log:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "ArmoryQt.py", line 21, in
  File "psutil\__init__.pyc", line 85, in
  File "psutil\_psmswindows.pyc", line 15, in
  File "_psutil_mswindows.pyc", line 12, in
  File "_psutil_mswindows.pyc", line 10, in __load
ImportError: DLL load failed: The specified procedure could not be found.

?

Armory version 0.89.99.16-testing:

On my Linux system, I have 2,300 addresses and probably 1,000-2,000 transactions.  It takes 24 sec to startup Armory on mainnet when I manage Bitcoin-Qt myself and it's already sync'd.  And 290 MB of RAM at steady-state.  

Latest version contains fragmented backup tester and Bitcoin-Qt-compatible message signing!  (and verification).

----- GPG-signed hashes of all installers (using the Armory Offline Signing Key)

   Armory 0.89.99.16-testing: Signed hashes of all installers

----- WINDOWS

  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Windows Vista, 7, 8 (Both 32- and 64-bit)

----- Mac/OSX

  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Mac/OSX 10.8 and 10.9

----- Ubuntu/Debian (packages are signed directly with offline GPG key using dpkg-sig)

  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Ubuntu/Debian 10.04-64bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Ubuntu/Debian 10.04-32bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Ubuntu/Debian 12.04-64bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing for Ubuntu/Debian 12.04-32bit

----- Ubuntu/Debian Offline Bundles

  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing Offline Bundle for Ubuntu/Debian 10.04-32bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing Offline Bundle for Ubuntu/Debian 10.04-64bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing Offline Bundle for Ubuntu/Debian 12.04-32bit
  Armory 0.89.99.16-testing Offline Bundle for Ubuntu/Debian 12.04-64bit





Thanks to picobit, we have a working testing release for OSX.  It appears like it might work on a much wider set of OSX systems, too!   (For reference, picobit basically gave me a recipe for building a portable Armory app, he didn't actually build it himself -- the package was built on my OSX system).  [note: there are bugs in 10.9/Mavericks that may make it unusable...gotta wait for Apple to fix it]

---

New features in 0.89.99.X (to be 0.90-beta when released):

• RAM usage and startup time reduction: RAM reduced to less than 300MB, and startup time typically under 60 seconds after initial DB build!
• Persistent database: Armory now maintains its own blockchain database for fast startup.  Make sure you have space to duplicate the blockchain (will be reduced in a subsequent version; this way was easier for now).
• Full MacOSX support*: thanks to picobit for the builder, though the Apple+PyQt bugs prevent full usability in 10.9.  Until Apple pushes an update, it may not be very usable on 10.9.
• New Backup Center:  Better organization and description of backup options.  Includes unencrypted digital backups, now.
• Fragmented Backups:  Shamir's Secret Sharing (M-of-N secret splitting); balance your physical security and redundancy.  Create up to 5-of-6 backups in Standard & Advanced modes.  Up to 8-of-12 in Expert mode.  Fragments are also deterministic for a given M value.  For example, if you make a 3-of-5 backup, you can later make a 3-of-7 and the first 5 will be the same as the 3-of-5 (but you will get different fragments if you do 2-of-N or 4-of-N!)
• SecurePrint: Paper backups optionally encrypted with code on screen to prevent private key exposure to printer and other network devices.  SecurePrint code should be identical across all backup types for a given wallet
• Half-sized paper backups:  The chaincode is now derived from the private key, meaning only two lines of data for wallets created with the new version of Armory.  Yet, all backup features work with older wallet without a hitch -- they'll all show four lines (if you don't believe me, prove me wrong and collect your 0.04 BTC!)
• Paper backup tester: test any kind of paper backup before you bury it in your backyard.  Includes subset testing of fragmented backups.
• Message Sign & Verify: Finally Bitcoin-Qt-compatible signing and verification.  Will have a new ASCII-armored version like PGP signing, soon
• Fixed broadcasting non-std signatures:  Older versions of Armory produced signatures that have non-standard padding.  If an older version is used on your offline system, you can't broadcast those signed transactions with 0.88.1 online.  This version will fix the padding and broadcast successfully
• Improve *nix Makefile:  Improved Makefile that should work out of the box on most Linux distros once the proper depedencies are installed.  See the osx_picobit directory for compiling on OSX.

---

The new sequence of operations executed by Armory (with auto-bitcoind) is outlined below.  The times are what I've observed in my testing on Linux Mint 64-bit with regular HDD (no SSD), and a Windows 7-64bit VM running on that same HDD.

• (1) Start bitcoind (using "--datadir" supplied on the command line)
• (2) Download/update blockchain (same as previous version, may take 4-16 hours)
• (3) Process all headers and determine longest chain ("headers-first" is new feature of Armory, will help with lite-node implementation later)
• (4) Build database of raw blockchain data from the blk*.dat files produced by bitcoind/-qt (30-90 min).
• (5) Scan database for transaction data relevant to your wallets (Linux: 5-20 min, Windows: 20-45 min)

Step 4 (building the DB) is done only once.  There is no reason to do it again (besides updating for new blocks), unless the user explicitly requests it using the " --rebuild" flag.
Step 5 also is only done once, unless you import or restore addresses or wallets.  Doing so will initiate a rescan of the blockchain to find the transaction history.  You can force a rescan using the "--rescan" flag.


Known Issues:

• Unicode everything  Ugh.  Will work on that after it works for US users.  The next version will get some unicode-TLC (it will mostly be a bug-fix and polishing release, with nothing major except for message signing)
• There are some DB consistency issues that may lead to a lot of DB rescanning and sometimes rebuilding.  If you always shutdown cleanly and don't interrupt Armory while it is updating, you will avoid that and it will start up quickly.  However, there does not appear to be any danger in having this happen, it's just inconvenient.
• Occasionally a zero-confirmation tx disappears when it is included in a block, instead of sticking around and getting one confirmation.  Restarting should fix it (even without a rescan!)
• Occasionally a crash with a "Partial StoredTx" error in the log file.  Please PM me if you observe this error.  I suspect I know the problem, but it would help to have someone who actively has it so I can test fixes

Instructions for building on Ubuntu/Debian:

This is just a copy of the build instructions on the website, but has an extra step to check out the "testing" branch instead of the "master" branch (which is still 0.88.1).

Just copy the following commands into a terminal one-by-one.  In Linux, you can simply highlight text using the mouse, then middle-click in the terminal (and press enter after each one).  It works between just about any two applications running in Linux, but it's especially important in the Linux terminal because Ctrl-C has a different meaning there.  (NOTE: do not copy the '$' symbols)