Topic: Will the free open source Armory wallet continue to be developed going forward? (Read 8486 times)

Good news. Thank you!

It has to be, at least to identify received locked outputs. At that point adding support for CLTV spends is trivial.


Not hard per se. GUI modifications are always a pain though.

Hey goatpig what about BIP65 support/UI? Is that on the to-do list? Is it hard to do it?

A product can be source-available, without being under a FOSS license.  This allows the community to review (without the need for an NDA) but only to run under a restrictive license (or possibly not legally to run at all without paying a fee).  Of course, not everyone will respect the license, but you have recourse to the courts if someone builds a business on your software illegally.  Recourse to the courts does rely on you finding out that the business is illegally using Armory, of course.  It's not perfect, but broadly speaking big financial institutions are likely to care about compliance.

Another compromise would be a closed source online component with an open source offline signer.  That's not perfect, either, but at least it gives a high degree of assurance for cold storage applications - which I presume are the main draw of Armory.  It's still far from ideal, though, since there's a very real risk that the government could require ATI to put a backdoor into the code.  Even though I'm not doing anything that would make me a target for government action, the very presence of such a backdoor would still increase the attack surface of my online system.

It's true that most [Armory] users won't check the source themselves.
I, for one, don't, and it would be close to the same if a) the software is open source or b) I know smart and trustworthy people have the source and check it, and provide the hash of a deterministic build which matches my closed-source binary.

The interesting point now is, who is a "smart and trustworthy" person? And how many independent ones would I need to be satisfied?
And, on the other hand, how many of them are looking at the open-source code right now? More? Fewer?

One thing is for sure, for me: a periodic clearnet connection from my wallet to a centralized server is a no-go. No matter what for, no matter where to.

Ente

That's the consultant angle. Companies seeking to insure their coins need to implement a secure stack the insurance company has approved of, and reviewed/certified by specialists (i.e. us). That's at least a couple layers on top of the blockchain. Eventually there will be enough business in the bitcoin space, and enough top layer applications, to create enough demand for this model to become sustainable.


Licensing contracts make sense in business to business transactions, not so much at the retail level. The reality is that our product is aimed a few high end users, whereas the mass of consumers want a convenient payment vector. Not our target demographic. We have a better shot at existing a layer beneath, providing security the Circles of the world.


If etotheipi quits, I would replace him in his capacity. Since he has no intention to let it die, I have no reason to take over.


Faster, smaller DB. Lots of bug fixes, better handling of Core's header first. Some internal changes to prepare for litenode.

Sorry I meant he needs an income stream is obvious, not open source or not. I hope everything works out and I'm curious to find out the story sometime.

Does anyone know what's new in 0.94 but not being released yet?

If that scheme could survive the loss of it's online product authorisation service, then ok. But if the software depends on a network that isn't Bitcoin before access can be permitted, and the authorisation network is down for whatever reason, than the approach is too inflexible and too vulnerable to disaster/attack/legacy status.


That's not obvious at all. etotheipi simply hasn't made any public statements regarding this issue, so whatever his private plans may or may not have been in the past, a final decision still doesn't appear to have been made.

There's a considerable backstory to all this, and it seems to me it will eventually be made public. Not my place to speak about it right now though.

What if they sell a hash of the file? I'd pay to get a signed hash using my public key to verify my software. Also drm works great online, so my software will send my hash to download updates automatically and verify them. Hold back a public hash.

Binaries are closed source anyway, so you can sell the binary, hash plus auto update while staying open source. Getting an armory binary off torrent would be a dumb way to get a virus. People capable of making binaries can respect that even though it's open source, it's not a free license. But can build to compare against paid binary.

Yes free open source would be nice, but obviously ethiopia doesn't agree and if he quits then what? Armory is the only desktop wallet I would ever use.

Not quite. You can sell digital data, you just have to accept that there's only ever one "copy" for sale. Adjust the price accordingly.

And that something else is expertise.  The "know-how", the (long-term) experience, that you can sell to those (generally businesses) that need bitcoin & wallet-related consulting services.

If I'd be a company needing to handle, deal with, store, secure & distribute bitcoins (e.g. a large or even a mid-size company accepting bitcoins), I would be happy to by for such services.  Actually, I would _need_ those services.
Handling money or anything of value costs something, that's just a fact.  Saving tens of thousands in credit card & banking fees, I would surely spend some of that on consulting & security services to be sure that I have good systems that use and store bitcoins.

Being a developer of Armory, or being the company behind it is, I think, an incredible visit card for proposing such services.

They went wrong because once the product became data, then it became a commodity whose price naturally wanted to collapse to the marginal cost of production (for data, very very low).

There will always be a market for entertainers to produce live performances and bespoke works, and that market doesn't require DRM because the product is intrinsically uncopyable.

Likewise, source code is just data. You can't really sell source code. You have to find something else, something intrinsically uncopyable, and sell that instead.

There are ways to distribute a closed source that's pseudo community reviewed: get a few key community members to sign a NDA, deliver them the code, reproducibly build the software and have every member sign the hash. This scenario is suboptimal on both ends though. Users don't want sign a NDA and the business doesn't want to expose the source to that many individuals, NDA or not.

Bitcoin is an open source market. You have no business developing core functionalities like wallets if you're not prepared to reveal the source and be scrutinized. Closed source and DRMs are old models, mostly created and maintained by the entertainment industry (for poor results). Trying to force that on the Bitcoin market is just a recipe for failure. The revenue model should adapt to the environment, the opposite approach is silly at best.

I'm no business man. I think the crowd funding model is a reasonable way forward for any long term FOSS project, but I can't fathom what a sustained revenue model would be like. I do think we do not yet have enough applications on top of Bitcoin to design such model. It's very possible some top layer app will "rule them all" and bring closure to the business cycle. Maybe Armory coupled with a hardware signer and a high level of customization could become the stack of choice to run Lightning payment channels in the future. Maybe the future of streaming will be proof of payments on some sidechain and decentralized distribution on top of namecoin. Time will tell.

One thing is certain, Bitcoin's business cycle is very long, and some people jumping into this market are too quick to dismiss this parameter.

Armory actually started as a crowd fund back in the day. I thought ethiopa would never deliver soo much. Thanks!

Ente's idea above sounds good.

goatpig and myself have independently come to the conclusion that a form of crowdfunding is a possible way to fund continuing software development under open source licensing.

So, I think there are alot of better options than some kind of signed/DRM closed source model. That's near enough the worst option to me; having published code (and better yet, re-producible builds) are the best way to implement software that manages something this crucial.

Afaik drm is the only way to do paid licenses. Not root kit shit but closed source requiring a license key.

Any time you think drm is the solution to your problem, you're solving the wrong problem.

A hardware-bundle might be an option. Like, a full-fledged Armory hardwarewallet. Armory only works with the hardware, you pay once for the set, and the software (or better yet both) are open source.
Everything else can be patched/forked out, if the code is open source.

Ente

If there was only a way to do drm with open source

It's true, and I am also abundantly aware that all Armory users are currently enjoying the largesse of bitcointalk member sunnankar & friends when it comes to funding this work properly. Huge gratitude towards Trace & others.

On the other hand, I can't share any enthusiasm for a possible closed-source product either; I'm not the only one, and there are sound reasons to distrust proprietary software, especially for cryptocurrency (and really for any software).

No I'd see if I'd want to donate to a forked project or a retail version or whatever happens. I'd gladly pay .5 btc for a lifetime license if it means better support and a better future. Then someone can keep patching the current open source one for donations.

Maybe just critical patches like the working with .11.1. It's already full of features. Goatpig gets to make a few Bitcoins and ethiopa gets to build his company with a steadier stream of income. I don't think it's a big deal. People can download the best and latest armory right now for free, but they can't expect it for life.

But would you donate under the present circumstances bitpop? Possibly you would, but knowing what I know about the intended changes to Armory (which is old information now, alot may have changed since then), I can't justify it for myself. And I can see how others might feel like that without knowing any extra details; it's investing in something with too much uncertainty in the return. You may end up being confronted with the retail price of the closed-source version the following day.

You can donate when sending a payment in the client

Your willingness to fork the project to keep it open source is reassuring. Unfortunately I have no choice but to research alternative clients because of the rumors of uncertainty being posted on the forum.


Thank you for your generous financial contribution to Armory. The features found in Armory have made bitcoin a viable payment method.

On one hand, you appear to be indicating that Armory needs funding, while on the other hand, you're directly turning down a donation offer from a user and dismissing the idea of end user donations as "cute." There are Armory users who depend on Armory to process significant transactions. If Armory needs funding from the people who use it, why not ask for the money or at least accept money from people who are offering it?

When I visit the Armory home page, I see no indication that the project is in need of funds or any fund raising effort whatsoever. There is no visual aid indicating how far into the red Armory is. I don't see a donations page or button. I see the opposite of raising money, Armory is matching donations to other organizations like the EFF, giving bitcoin away. https://bitcoinarmory.com/donation-match-list/ I found a donations payment address in a discrete location on the bottom of the contacts page by searching the Armory home page with a search engine.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I do not see any indication of a donation area, button, or payment address within the Armory client itself either.

I would be happy to voluntarily donate to the project. However, discussions casting doubt on Armory's future as open source software are alarming because closed source cryptographic software is a nonstarter and Armory is a critical application for some of your end users. Armory devolving into a black box will motivate Armory users to look elsewhere.

And I also want to add, because the developers deserves kudos, that I think that Armory is a piece of great software, and that it was much appreciated that it be made available to the community like that.  I personally think it is a very good (and important) support to the Bitcoin ecosystem by providing extremely secure & reliable ways to store coins - especially in this wild & dangerous "Far-West" world that is the young age of Bitcoin.
If Armory wouldn't have been there, many more people would have lost coins by leaving them on exchanges that got hacked or scammed their users.  (MtGox & cie, anyone?)

I know that words like "thanks" and "gratefulness" do not feed a mouth or pay the rent, but I still think they are important words to say.  It might feed something else.  

Everything public is public, there is no official announcement on any of this, possibly (hopefully) because a final decision has still not been made. We all await it eagerly, myself included.

Is there any official announcement about the state / future / plans of/for Armory right now?

I get from different posts that there is an unpleasant situation looming in, with people already declaring Armory "dead" (yet, Bitcoin has been declared dead many times - haven't even the CEO of Bitcoin said it on the news? )

What do we know at the moment? (apart that there is not much development)

What are his plans exactly?

Is he going to start charging to use Armory or something?

0.93.3 update to deal with BIP 62 live:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/armory-0933-with-bip62-compliance-1229596

+1

goatpig is king

CircusPeanut merged the fix into 0.93 and etotheipi and I have reviewed the code. It should be going public soon enough.

Uh oh, I haven't tried sending lately

Armory is not compatible yet with 0.11.1. Newest Bitcoin Core enforces LowS while Armory signs HighS. Users are reporting they are unable to send bitcoin using Armory after upgrading Bitcoin Core 0.11 to 0.11.1 and had to downgrade.

Why?

So Armory is kill?

Ah, if we only had some kind of technology to pay anonymously, via the internet..
:-P
(true, the software surely won't be open source, and/or wants to regularly call home. Both huge risks for such a preselected usergroup)

Ente

Of course businesses only survive by attracting paying customers, so the need of Armory to do so is clear.

I'm not sure you appreciate the way that Armory's value to potential customers changes as a result of being closed source.

I guess Alan sent out a bunch of form letter PMs in September about this change. I got one wherein he mentioned a possible "power user licence", which to me is a complete non-starter.

Even though I have no problem paying for software, I'd never buy a license for a closed-source version of Armory. Once somebody who wants to steal Bitcoins decides they can get the best bang for their buck by going after cold storage users, they are going to make a beeline to Armory to obtain that list of licensed users and/or attempt to compromise your internal source repository and insert a backdoor.

Personally, I will never use a cold storage wallet that I don't compile myself from publicly-available source. A closed-source Bitcoin wallet is a spearphisher's wet dream.

I was made aware of Alan Reiner's plans for Armory on Septmeber the 8th this year, and I'm not happy with this situation either. I agreed then not to reveal what he told me, but I suspect most of you will not be happy (but, only if the proposal I was informed of is what actually transpires).

I hope that they accept some version of an alternative model that I proposed, and hopefully the continuing indecision on this is a reflection of uncertainty about the September 8th proposal amongst the management of ATI.

I won't let that happen =)

Cute sentiment but I do not think you understand the type of resources required to build this type of software where individuals can generate and hold the private keys of their own wealth. Funding the building out of the core infrastructure the entire community uses has not been cheap and many people have made significant sacrifices of both time and money to get Bitcoin where it is today.

This type of cryptography and software code is complicated and to be sustainable requires very skilled developers. Projects can be maintained on a donation basis but that is usually not very sustainable without either (1) large sacrifices of opportunity cost by the developers, like the extremely poor guy who maintains PGP, or (2) a very generous and magnanimous financial benefactor. Usually it requires a combination of the two like Dr. Wuille, Dr. Adam Back thinks is one of our community's greatest assets, who took a significant pay cut to work full-time on Bitcoin.

To help you understand the magnitude; in Armory's case I and two ideologically aligned friends were the generous and magnanimous financial benefactors of the $600,000 seed round. Additionally, I solely and personally assumed, via binding legal contract, the downside of the exchange rate risk but let the upside in the Bitcoin price accrue to the company so developers would know their paychecks were going to be there and they could plan for their families. As a result, there have been over $1,000,000 of resources consumed by the project. That is many many orders of magnitude more financial support than all of the donations of the entire community combined and 10-20x more than the PGP guy's Linux grant.

And there are other wallet initiatives that have received significant financial assistance like my buddy Roger Ver who helped fund Blockchain.info and Roger and I both funded the initial seed round for Bitpay that has released the Copay wallet.

Unfortunately, great software does not just write itself yet and we should all remember that developers need to eat food, provide for families, use computers, etc. but that is not the world we live in.

Rest in Peace armory, we loved you, you never let us down, till now.
hope this project won't die

Same for me  Do we need more donations or something?

armory is the only wallet i use

Our bug ticketing and code review engine is internal only. You'll have to toy with it.

Is there a list of those bugs somewhere? I would like to take a look and see if I can fix them so that I can use 0.94.

It is in a state that's somehow close to what 0.94 should have been, but it has some major bugs left in it. You can play with it if you wish.

Was the ffreeze branch the same as the gitian-ffreeze currently in the github?

That's being worked on on top of 0.93.3 afaik.

Ok.

Can you guys at least put out an update for lowS signatures so that armory will work with bitcoin core 0.11.1?

If it comes down to that I will release everything I have and maintain the software myself.

Would you guys be able to republish it so that we can make aaacommunity developed version based on what has already been written?

It was removed sometimes mid August

So it's no longer on github?

I will explain that in due time. Rest, assured, the community will get an in length explanation when this whole situation is sorted out.


If you have a local copy of the ffreeze branch with its last commit (before it was pulled from the repo), you would have access to that.

Not sounding good. I hope you take care to warn Armory users not to upgrade to latest Bitcoin Core 0.11.1.

When will this resume and what exactly stopped its development in the first place?

Where can I get it?

A reply is in order. Stuff I ignore I do on purpose, so no point asking again.


Not much to reply to people that don't see the benefit of running full nodes.


I've been the defacto maintainer of the FOSS version since about a year. etotheipi and the rest of the team are busy with the high end enterprise features, and running the company (which is a lot more work than I would have guessed!)


All FOSS development has halted since sometimes in August. Bug fixes are worked on, but currently the FOSS version is limited to 0.93.

Long story short, we are in the process of figuring things out. I can tell you a couple things for now:

1) The team has a strong intention to resume FOSS development.
2) 0.94 has been ready since July

I used Armory in the first place for cold storage. Switched to Trezor and no longer use it. Now that hardware wallets are common and inexpensive Armory is looking long in the tooth. If it would fully support Trezor (multiple hidden wallets with passphrases) it would have an edge over myTrezor and Multibit HD as a more private solution. I would very much like to use a fully validating node with Trezor. Would I pay for it? Nope.

I would like to know too. Armory is great.

Hard to say. The github hasn't been updated in several months but the other developers of armory have been active on this forum recently.

• No new version recently.
• No comments heard from Armory developers when a person asks about what Armory has that Copay doesn't: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/what-armory-does-that-copay-cant-1205245
• etotheipi hasn't commented here on these forums in months.

I'm getting a bit worried. Questions:

• Has Armory become profitable with its paid products yet? I hope it has.
• In any case, will the free open source Armory wallet that we all love continue to be developed going forward? Can I count on it for my bitcoin security over the coming years?