Monday, November 26, 2012

Bitcoin Basics and Ubuntu 12.04

This article contains some help for those starting to get into using bitcoin and contains help I have found when reading through different forums and experiences made. It also assumes some basic knowledge about Bitcoin in general, bitcoin client the meaning of mining, mining software, blocks, hashing rate and so on. All this information can be found in the Bitcoin Wiki and only requires some reading and no actual deep programming knowledge.


Contents of this Article

  • About Bitcoin
  • Installing the Bitcoin Client
  • Mining & Mining Software
  • Where to Mine
  • Downloads & Links
  • Earn Your First Coins (for free)
  • Sources

About Bitcoin

 

"Bitcoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority or banks; managing transactions and the issuing of bitcoins is carried out collectively by the network. Bitcoin is open-source; its design is public, nobody owns or controls Bitcoin and everyone can take part."[1]

Originally Bitcoin was developed by an anonymous person calling himself "Satoshi Nakamoto", his real identity is still unknown. [2]

The network uses the SHA256 algorithm  that is very fast to compute and hence allowed technology companies to develop specialized hardware for bitcoin mining, the coin generation process. The mining process includes a "puzzle" a machine can solve and based on the outcome of this puzzle a block might be generated. Upon finding a new block, 25 BTC is added to the miner. Blocks are generated on a predictable rate (1 block every 10 minutes) and the reward for finding a block halves on a pre-determined basis. These factors limit the total number of available bitcoins in the system, which will be 21 million coins once the system reaches this point in the future.

The easy calculation of SHA256 hashes made it available to develop specialized hardware such as FPGAs (Field programmable Gate Array) and ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) that specialize in bitcoin mining. Such hardware have dramatically shifted the bitcoin mining process and increased the global hash rate of the network. Whether this is good or bad, everyone has to decide for him/herself. one thing is for sure, bitcoin is growing faster than before. Currently 1 coin (BTC) is worth over 500$ and it does not seem to slow down. 

And here is a short video explaining a few things and introducing Bitcoin.

 

Installing the Bitcoin Client 

 

First of all what you should know that there are 2 versions of the official bitcoin client, bitcoin and bitcoin-qt. Bitcoin is the command line client that is for more advanced users while bitcoin-qt is the graphical user interface (GUI) version that is easier to use (aim to use the bitcoin-qt, GUI version).

Known issue with the client under Ubuntu: The icon does not show in the Unity menu bar (top of the screen where email etc is.). It shows up when first installing, but after that it is gone. As said above, I tried building from source to see if the problem is solved that way, but it isn't. Not a big impact, just a minor issue, but I personally would like to be displayed there, hopefully this will be fixed soon. Update: This issue has been fixed in the Latest Client (as far as I saw).

1. Amending Software Sources (PPA) - Recommended 

 

Update: This seems to be the predominantly supported and easiest way of installing bitcoin-qt on an Ubuntu system.

Edit your software sources by,
sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list
and add the 2 lines at the end of the file,  
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE main

Where of course you replace "YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE" with the name of your Ubuntu version, e.g. 12.04 is "precise". If this is not perfectly clear for you or you are using another version than 12.04 of Ubuntu then check out this link for help: https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin. After this simply run in the terminal,
sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install bitcoin-qt
It is now installed on your system in /home/[USER]/.bitcoin You can create a desktop launcher or launch it from unity panel or your favourite place. If you need more help: Bitcoin.org
 

2. Installing the Bitcoin Client - Alternative 1

 

Installation by downlaoding the latest bitcoin *.tar.gz file. As per the README file tells:
  1. Download the latest *.tar.gz file from bitcoin.org
  2. Unzip the contents into a folder
  3. Run sudo apt-get install libqtgui4 to install Qt4 runtime libraries (if you had a previous version installed this should already exist on your system)
  4. Run either of the 4 executable installers (according to your system)
 bin/32/bitcoin-qt (GUI, 32-bit)  bin/32/bitcoind (headless, 32-bit)  bin/64/bitcoin-qt (GUI, 64-bit)  bin/64/bitcoind (headless, 64-bit)
This should install the bitcoin client onto your system.

3. Building from Source - Alternative 2

 

To get the bitcoin client clone the official github repository first and then decide whether you need the GUI version (bitcoin-qt) or just the terminal one. Clone the github repository,
git clone https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin ROUTE
where "ROUTE" is the route to the folder you want to copy to. Leave empty to clone it to your home directory. Also you will need some packages installed, get these by running
sudo apt-get install qt4-qmake libqt4-dev build-essential libboost-dev libboost-system-dev libboost-filesystem-dev libboost-program-options-dev libboost-thread-dev libssl-dev libdb4.8++-dev
3.a. Terminal Version

This is fully in the terminal. After the github repository as been downloaded and the necessary packages applied, simply execute (as per doc/readme-qt.rst)
qmake 
make
Now note that as said this is the terminal version of the bitcoin client, it comes with no graphical interface, all arguments must be given in the terminal. It is highly advised that you do not use this option.
If qmake gives an error, try
qmake "USE_UPNP=-" 
make
3.b. GUI Version

You have to get a program called "Qt-creator" from the software centre so go ahead and download it.
Also you will need the packages as mentioned above so install those if you have not done so already.
If you have it navigate to the cloned github repository, right-click bitcoin-qt.pro and select "Open with Qt Creator"
This will open up Qt, here click on run on the bottom left of the screen 
and this will create an executable file in the bitcoin folder that will run bitcoin-qt. Run as you would any other file.

Mining & Mining Software 

You can either mine alone - in "solo" - where the possibility of you finding a block (25 BTC ~ 7000 Euros, but doesn't matter as it is changing all the time) is above 40 years, or you can mine for a group - called "pools" - where you get a share of the 25 BTC based on the help you provided. With solo mining you may not receive anything at all, but you might find a block and get the total 25 BTC, whereas in a pool you will have more steady, but smaller payments. As the difficulty and global hash rate are high, it is highly advised to join and mine a pool.

Installing poclbm-GUI


Either way you want to go, you need a software to mine and start hashing. I suggest using poclbm-gui miner which is easy to set up and gives the same functions as the terminal version. The things you will need on your system installed are,  
python 2.6 or above (3 is not supported)
wxpython, get them from synaptic package manager.

nVidia Cards:
numpy and PyOpenCL, that can again be again installed from synaptic package manager.

Launch synaptic package manager with: sudo synaptic and make a search for the packages and install.  

ATI video cards: If you have an ATI card and plan to use it for mining (which will be much faster than CPU or nVidia cards) the you also need an ATI Stream SDK downloaded and installed. You can get the latest version of poclbm GUI miner from github,
git clone https://github.com/Kiv/poclbm
and then to run,
cd /home/[USER]/poclbm
python guiminer.py
This will run the guiminer (the front end software) and also poclbm miner, however if you want to use other mining software (e.g. cgminer), it has to be downloaded and installed manually (see links at end of the post and at List of Bitcoin Mining Software). I leave this to you, you have to decide what software you want to use or rather what does your hardware support (!). With all the different ASICS out you will need to check for support. Cgminer is generally a good option to go for and installing it is very simple and it is described in the readme file.

Look for what you need; clone git repo, cd to git repo, ./configure, make, make install or refer to documentation. After say you have downlaoded cgminer, you can use the GUIminer to control it. This virtually poses no overhead on your hash rate. Make sure you set the correct path to your mining software! Refer to software screenshots below. I recommend you create a "miners" directory within the guiminer and put all miners you use in here. Just to keep things in one place.

Mining in Solo 


Firstly go to ~/.bitcoin directory (to see hidden folders press "Ctrl+H" in the file manager, in your home directory) and create a new file called bitcoin.conf if you do not have it already. Put 3 lines in the file,
rpcuser=local_username rpcpassword=password_you_want_to_use_make_it_long_and_strong
rpcport=8332 
Keep these secure. Setting up solo mining requires the bitcoin client to be started up in server mode. To do this, close the client if you have it already running and and start bitcoin-qt with the following command from the terminal,
bitcoin-qt -server -RPCALLOWIP=192.168.0.* -RPCPORT=8332
Alternatively
Add the line:
server=1
into ~/.bitcoinbitcoin.conf too.
###
If you are using Windows this is quite similar, open the command line and do,
cd Program Files (x86)\Bitcoin
bitcoin-qt.exe -server -RPCALLOWIP=192.168.0.* -RPCPORT=8332
###
Where192.168.0.* is you local IP address range, note that this might be different based on your home network settings. This is to tell the client to allow miner connections from the local network. Start mining software as normal and set up a new solo miner, refer to picture below.

Ext. Path: Absolute path to your miners installed. Make sure it is pointing to the right executable file.   
Server: Choose solo  
Host: localhost
Port: Just use 8332, make sure it is the same as you have launched the client with & set in your bitcoin.conf  
Username: As per set in ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf  
Password: As per set in ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf  
Extra flags: Flags for the miner, like "-v -w 128', this depends on the miner and graphics card you are using. You can look up a list of best settings for different cards Bitcoin Wiki After setting up to mine in solo, you should see a similar window:
Ubuntu
Windows
If you have launched the client right, got the matching username & password you should be mining in solo.

Mining for a Pool 


Pooled mining is the "easier" from the 2. From the dropdown menu simply choose which pool you want to mine for - or choose "other" if it is not listed - type in your account credentials and other information necessary, specified on the pool's homepage and start mining. Please refer to the images and information discussed above in "Mining in Solo". Of course, username and password in this case will be the ones specific to your pool's one and not the one set it  ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf ! If you are looking for a pool to mine for, scroll to the bottom of this post!

Note: Setting all these up is not difficult at all, once you have figured out how to do it. I hope I could save you some time of looking around the internet and browsing through different forums for finding the right information. If you however require any further help or anything was not clear or just got stuck, leave a comment and I will get back to you and do my best to help.

Downloads & Links

  • poclbm with GUI - Github (Kiv); GPU miner using OpenCL, Nvida & ATI; Recommended as it contains GUI and mining software alike!
  • Ufasoft CPU/GPU minerdarkgamex.ch; has to be built from source (Windows & Linux)
  • Diablo GPU miner - Github (Diablo);Uses Java ant the OpenCL framework for hashing; ATI & Nvidia cards
  • cgminer - ck.kolivas.org; multi-threaded multi-pool GPU, FPGA and CPU miner
  • phoenix miner - Github;
  • Bitcoin client - Github & Bitcoin.org (Windows & Linux)
  • To learn more about miner software read Bitcoin Wiki 
  • Mining Hardware comparison and best Flags Bitcoin Wiki 
  • Bitcoin Mining Calculator (profit, based on hashing speed, current price & difficulty) 

Earn Your First Coins (For Free) 


Dailybitcoins.org - Some micro bitcoins every hour, random prizes and advertising opportunity. Nice option for those new to Bitcoin to make their first coins fast and for people who want to advertise alike.
Bitvisitor.org - Earn bitcoins for watching videos
CoinURL.com -  Earn bitcoins for publishing ads on your website, by shortening URLs and you can even advertise with bitcoins.

Where to Mine


Update: Please note that "hobby mining" may no longer be profitable with the ever-increasing difficulty and even the cheapest electricity prices. Furthermore cloudmining is often leading to losses and not to profit! At this point I can personally only recommend LTCGear that offers profitable mining power that scales with the difficulty and the below linked GAWminers.

Free 10 GH/s for New Users at GAWminers


This takes 3-5 minutes to set up, here is how.
  1. Use  this  link to register and claim your reward.
  2. After registration you will be given a short tutorial about the website. Click through the tutorial. (Important!)
  3. At the end of the tutorial you will be given a Genesis Hashlet (10GH/s)
  4. Select a Bitcoin mining pool for it and drag&drop onto your new hashlet.
You are done and mining Bitcoin with 10GH/s!

CEX.io


Join me mining and trading at CEX.io, here you get the following benefits:
  • Mine in the ghash.io pool with 0% fee
  • Rent Hashing Power (GH/s) (With BTC or NMC)
  • You can buy & sell GH/s from the cloud that will work for you OR you can simply make a profit on buying and selling these shares. No fee.
  • Invite others and get 3% bonus of their GH/s in extra to your account (this does not affect the invited person in a negative manner)
  • Merged mining of Bitcoin, Namecoin, Devcoin and IXcoin. These do not require extra work, but increase your profit.
  • Warning! Maintenance fees are so high that it practically only makes sense to TRADE at CEX.io. Buying hashing power and letting it work will make you lose money on the long term!

Triplemining


You can also join me mining at Triplemining where:
  • The pool gets all the shares
  • You have a chance to win the weekly jackpot of around ~0.4 BTC
  • You can make your own "minipool" and earn more by inviting others
  • Lowest payout limit that I have seen among pools (0.01 BTC) 

Sources


[1] - http://bitcoin.org
[2] - https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki
Original Bitcoin Paper

35 comments:

  1. thanks for your post, few questions:

    1) Link here "Update: This issue has been fixed in the latest version (0.7.2; as far as I can tell)." is broken, I get "Your current account does not have access to view this page."

    and latest version now 0.8 i think...

    2) You say:
    deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE main
    deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE main

    Where of course you replace "YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE" with the name of your Ubuntu version, e.g. 12.04 is precise. After this simply run in the terminal,

    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get install bitcoin

    I added these lines:
    deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu 12.04 main
    deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu 12.04 main

    and when I run sudo apt-get update I get:
    W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu/dists/12.04/main/source/Sources 404 Not Found
    W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu/dists/12.04/main/binary-i386/Packages 404 Not Found

    If I put "precise" instead of "12.04" and run apt-get update, I get:
    W: Duplicate sources.list entry http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu/ precise/main i386 Packages (/var/lib/apt/lists/ppa.launchpad.net_bitcoin_bitcoin_ubuntu_dists_precise_main_binary-i386_Packages)
    W: You may want to run apt-get update to correct these problems

    And if I try to install bitcoin I get:
    $ sudo apt-get install bitcoin
    Reading package lists... Done
    Building dependency tree
    Reading state information... Done
    E: Unable to locate package bitcoin

    3) In "Building from Source - Alternative 2" you are writing "This is fully in the terminal. After the github repository as been downloaded and the necessary packages applied, simply execute (as per doc/readme-qt.rst)".

    I run:
    qmake
    make

    and as a result I got "bitcoin-qt" but not bitcoin. I am trying to install terminal version, and no lock so far...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hello.
      1. I am updating this article from time to time. Between updates there might be new releases of the software. At the last update version 0.7.2 was the latest.

      2. You have to rewrite "YOUR_UBUNTU_VERSION_HERE" with the version codename and not number, hence "precise" in your case. So that,
      deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu precise main
      deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/bitcoin/bitcoin/ubuntu precise main

      Then
      sudo apt-get update
      sudo apt-get install bitcoin

      should work. You can check out https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin

      If you can't make it to work, install it with the executable files.

      3. It was a while ago when I tried this, but for now I am using the bitcoin-qt (GUI) as it is simpler to use. I'll update the article as soon as I can with some additional information in this topic. In the meanwhile I suggest you go through the documentation that comes with the tar.gz package. Everything should be in there for installation.

      https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/README

      bitcoind (bitcoin daemon) is the one you are looking for, I assume.

      Delete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Has anyone got one of these running yet (http://www.bitminingservers.com)? They are from china... so I'm just wondering about the quality.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have just read this today: http://bitcoinmagazine.com/working-avalon-asic-confirmed/
    I don't have anything near as powerful as these so I cannot comment. However, payback seems to be really fast. Also, if all those ASICs will be added to the network, individual profits will reduce fast.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Bitcoin mining on Ubuntu isn't recommended. Since graphics card makers cant come to an agreement about driver installations that actually work... Your Ubuntu machine cant process the bit coins with Ubuntu generic drivers. Linux will never take place of windows without over coming graphic cards and sound driver problems. Simple as that. And I luv my Ubuntu. Just sad..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've an ubuntu box with correct lastest ATI drivers from ATI, running cgminer, and churning out fractions of bitcoin every day from the pool which I'm in. Windows do not have a monopoly over driver support.

      Delete
  6. Hi.

    So I went with poclbm with GUI as you had suggested. The GUI loads just fine but I've registered with and attempted to connect to several mining pools (following each sites instructions) and I am unable to connect to any of them. I also tried setting up a solo miner following your instructions and even then it said it had problems connecting (which doesn't matter to me to much considering my chance of finding a block are slim, but the fact I can't even connect to myself shows there is some kind of problem).

    I've been trying to figure this out for about 3 days now and I am getting quite frustrated. I really do not want to have to mine on my windows partition as I would like to keep it solely for the use of gaming, plus I crunch for several BOINC projects as well and would like to be able to have my GPU mine while my 4 cores crunch WU. I've tried to get phoenix set up as well, but haven't been successful there either. I really wish .deb (or other executables) would become the standard for apps written for linux, it really would make things easier and encourage basic computer users to drop their windows and/or macs. Sorry for the vagueness in this post, but it's late, I'm tired and frustrated.

    Any help would be appreciated,
    Thanks.
    Sabo.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sabo here. I found a miner that was a breeze to get started, just needed to install IceTea Java Webstart, set up an account on the pools website (of course) and just start up the pools built in miner. The miner is exclusive to this pool (can't use it with any other) but hey, it works and the pools has a lot of computing power ( dunno the conversion for FLOPS to THPS but Bitminter.com is 1.95Thps at the moment). Min auto donation is 2% which isn't to bad compared to most other pools I've looked at, except for Triplemining which as you stated: pool gets all the shares and there is a weekly jackpot. I would still like to get one of these stand alone miners to work so I can start using my triplemining worker that I created.

      And Critter, I'd say that is untrue considering the fact that Valve (Steam is now available for linux) is slowly migrating to Linux (Ubuntu being their preferred distro). They've already made 100 games compatible for linux and they are working on converting more over. And Valve being a game company, works closely with GPU manufactures so you can bet that open source drivers are only going to get better as time goes by.

      Delete
  7. Hello Sabo!

    I think it is one of 2 things:
    1. If you get "Connecting" continuously, but do not eventually connect then it is likely that the path to your mining software is set incorrectly or does not work on your system for some reason. Ie., you don't have the miner. Note, that not all miners come included in poclbm guiminer, you have to download them separately.

    2. If you eventually get "Connection refused" then I would suspect more of a connection/internet issue. Firewall maybe?

    However, the fact that you have tried multiple pools suggest that it is the first case.

    I would suggest you try to run mining from the terminal. With ufasoft miner for example this goes as:
    ./bitcoin-miner -o http://user:password@server
    If you have an ATI card you probably want to use OpenCLMiner or CGMineer. The syntax is similar. Unfortunately I cannot test this since I don't have an ATI card with me currently.

    Check out https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer and try to run it form terminal and see if you get a connection.

    Please tell if you found a way! Hope this helped a little.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I never got a "connection refused". It'd start with "connection problem" and then switch to "connecting" and that's where it'd stay.

      Also, I have a GTX650 Ti (so Cuda).

      Ufasoft was one of the first I looked at, but I couldn't find the dl link on the link in your tutorial. So where is the DL link on that page?

      I downloaded cgminer a few days ago, just haven't attempted to set it up yet (since I like having a GUI). I'll give it a try next week to attempt setting up a stand alone miner next week. I've had enough frustrating days the past few days that for the moment, I'm going to just mine for bitminter for a couple of days then try setting up cgminer and getting one of these miners to actually work.

      Also, there is an OpenCLminer.py in the Poclbm folder... isn't that a miner?

      Delete
    2. But yes, when I attempt again, I'll let you know how it goes. If I have any problems you'll be the man to ask cause this is the most comprehensive, well written tutorial I've found. =)

      Sabo

      Delete
    3. Yes I checked the link and apparently it doesn't work anymore, I will update it shortly.

      Try here: http://darkgamex.ch/ufasoft/

      So terminal>cd to folder>
      ./bitcoin-miner -o http://user:password@server

      This should start you hashing and the hashing speed should be displayed in the terminal window.

      Running simply ./bitcoin-miner will show you the options you can have.

      @tutorial
      Thank you, I have spent quite some time with all this I wanted to share my findings. Also, I try to keep the post updated as far as possible.

      Delete
    4. so out of the list, which is the best option: [ ] ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.29-x64-portable.tar.lzma or [ ] ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32-x64-portable.tar.xz? And is this stand alone, or does it require cgminer, or can I use GUI miner with it(just curious... it running in the terminal is fine with me; less GPU usage then with a GUI).

      Sabo

      Delete
    5. Once you download the miner, you should be able to sue guiminer with it. You just have to set the path to "bitcoin-miner".

      Download "ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32.tar.lzma"
      Unpack it.
      open a terminal, cd to the folder and
      ./configure
      make

      After this you will see the executable file in the folder.
      You can either run this from terminal (as above) or open the guiminer and set the ufasoft miner path to this file.

      Delete
    6. So I followed your instructions (had to download some synaptic packages to get it to complete) and I got 2 errors at the end of the process: make[1]: *** [bitcoin-miner] Error 1
      make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32'
      make: *** [all] Error 2

      I've looked in the folder and I don't see an executable. The only things in the folder labled "Bitcoin-miner" are: bitcoin-miner.o, bitcoin-miner.rc, bitcoin-miner.sin, bitcoin-miner.vcxproj, bitcoin-miner.vcxproj.filters.

      Sabo

      Delete
    7. I have the AMD-64bit specific Ubuntu distro using the cinnamon desktop (not a fan of unity) if that helps you understand what is going on. kinda why when I asked which one to use they were both the 64bit versions of the package.

      also, here are a few lines before the error messages (if they give any helpful input to the problem):

      scrypt.o: In function `Ext::Crypto::CalcSCryptHash_80_3way(unsigned int const*)':
      /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32/el/crypto/scrypt.cpp:344: undefined reference to `ScryptCore_x64_3way'
      /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32/el/crypto/scrypt.cpp:366: undefined reference to `Sha256Update_4way_x86x64Sse2'
      /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32/el/crypto/scrypt.cpp:389: undefined reference to `Sha256Update_4way_x86x64Sse2'
      /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32/el/crypto/scrypt.cpp:391: undefined reference to `Sha256Update_4way_x86x64Sse2'
      /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32/el/crypto/scrypt.cpp:394: undefined reference to `Sha256Update_4way_x86x64Sse2'
      collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

      Delete
    8. just attempted the portable, lol. yeah, there is no config file in there.

      it was worth a shot.

      Delete
    9. That is a configuration error, so it fails to build it. Can you check the installation instructions? There is some stuff in it.

      Also I will try to look for some CUDA miners for you.

      Delete
    10. Installation Instructions
      *************************

      If you have AMD cards:
      1. download AMD APP SDK from http://developer.amd.com/sdks/AMDAPPSDK/downloads/Pages/default.aspx
      2. install it
      3. run followig:
      export AMDAPPSDKROOT=/some/path
      ./configure

      If you have not AMD videocard, run:
      ./configure --disable-amdapp


      Then run:
      make
      or
      make CPPFLAGS=-DUCFG_TRC=1 # enable tracing


      Optionally run:
      make install


      If the program don't find OpenCL.so run it as:
      LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$AMDAPPSDKROOT/lib/x86 ./bitcoin-miner

      that is the INSTALL file. There is also an install.sh... doesn't that do all the terminal installation procedures at the back end?

      Also, thanks, i'd like a CUDA miner. The bitminter miner is OpenCL and I'm averaging around 51.50 Mhps. even if a CUDA miner only adds a few to that, it's still better then OpenCL.

      Delete
    11. Just attempted your initial instructions but added --disable-amdapp
      after the ./configure as the instructions suggest. got the same errors as before.

      Sabo

      Delete
    12. just did:

      cd /home/sid/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32
      ./configure --disable-amdapp
      make CPPFLAGS=-DUCFG_TRC=1 # enable tracing

      and got:
      checking build system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
      checking host system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
      checking target system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
      checking for a BSD-compatible install... /usr/bin/install -c
      checking whether build environment is sane... yes
      checking for a thread-safe mkdir -p... /bin/mkdir -p
      checking for gawk... gawk
      checking whether make sets $(MAKE)... yes
      checking for gcc... gcc
      checking whether the C compiler works... yes
      checking for C compiler default output file name... a.out
      checking for suffix of executables...
      checking whether we are cross compiling... no
      checking for suffix of object files... o
      checking whether we are using the GNU C compiler... yes
      checking whether gcc accepts -g... yes
      checking for gcc option to accept ISO C89... none needed
      checking for style of include used by make... GNU
      checking dependency style of gcc... gcc3
      checking for g++... g++
      checking whether we are using the GNU C++ compiler... yes
      checking whether g++ accepts -g... yes
      checking dependency style of g++... gcc3
      checking for g++... /usr/bin/g++
      checking for pcre_compile in -lpcre... yes
      checking for pthread_create in -lpthread... yes
      checking for curl_global_init in -lcurl... yes
      checking for dlopen in -ldl... yes
      checking for clock_gettime in -lrt... yes
      checking for gcc 4.4... yes
      checking for pthread_setname_np... yes
      checking for jwasm... no
      configure: WARNING: Cannot find jwasm, building slow version. For better performance install it from here: http://www.japheth.de/JWasm.html
      configure: creating ./config.status
      config.status: creating Makefile
      config.status: creating config.h
      config.status: config.h is unchanged
      config.status: executing depfiles commands
      sid@Discordia:~/poclbm/ufasoft_bitcoin-miner-0.32$ make CPPFLAGS=-DUCFG_TRC=1 # enable tracing

      I've got to start dinner so I'll be back to attempt again later tonight.

      Thanks for the help,
      Sabo.

      Delete
    13. After make, you still didn't get an executable file?

      Also back to guiminer, check this screenshot again:
      https://lh3.ggpht.com/-IVbngHHdIbA/ULPVGAdw3vI/AAAAAAAAAKM/GYVuuxi6HDk/s400/solominer+2012-11-26+20:44:48.png
      Make sure that the "Ext.Path" is pointing to an existing miner. It should work from there. And the fact that you can't mine in solo also suggest that it's a miner issue and not internet connection. Try making a CUDA miner again.

      Also, you can try cgminer (https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer) and there is a guide/readme as well on Github. Don't know if it will work with nVidia card.

      Have to go to sleep now. I have a think about all this by tomorrow.

      Delete
    14. So I've been trying to follow this guy's tutorial: http://0x80.org/blog/bitcoin-mining-rpcminer-cuda-in-linux/

      I'm stuck on missing repositories because even though according to synaptic package manager I have openssl but I keep getting this error:

      -- checking for module 'openssl'
      -- package 'openssl' not found
      CMake Error at /usr/share/cmake-2.8/Modules/FindPackageHandleStandardArgs.cmake:91 (MESSAGE):
      Could NOT find OpenSSL, try to set the path to OpenSSL root folder in the
      system variable OPENSSL_ROOT_DIR (missing: OPENSSL_LIBRARIES
      OPENSSL_INCLUDE_DIR)

      I'm not sure where it is asking me to set the path. Does it want me to put some lines in the .cmake file it is trying to work with, or redirect the path that I am working with in the terminal?

      His instructions are lacking; like the part about removing lines of code from the cmakelist.txt, he could be a bit more specific as to what lines (cause someone that doesn't understand code really well, some of the lines seem pretty vague to me). And also, since I don't need another wallet do I need to compile the file with those in it (along with the code that pertains to them in the cmakelist.txt)?

      Anyway, I think I am done attempting this for the night.

      Thanks for all the help thus far,
      Sabo

      Delete
    15. Unfortunately I cannot do testing on CUDA, as the machine I currectly have with me is rtaher old and has no proper graphics card. Other machines have ATI cards.

      @ openssl, do you have the required libraries installed? Check synaptic package manager.

      Delete
    16. "I'm stuck on missing repositories because even though according to synaptic package manager I have openssl but I keep getting this error:"

      I have it, I just don't understand the error it threw at me.

      Delete
    17. So I just tried again and have advanced to a new missing package. I installed it from synaptic package manager. I've rebooted since my last try with the openssl error. So I'ma try rebooting and see if it will notice it upon reboot. If that is the case, this is going to be annoying, but if it gets a cuda miner built, I'm ganna do it.

      Sabo

      Delete
    18. So Now it's saying it can't find BerkeleyDB. I did a search for it in the synaptic package manager and the only option was libberkeleydb-perl. installed it. Tried again. rebooted. Still can't find it. Which I find kinda funny cause I run BOINC almost 24/7 and am attached to several projects that have GPU (Cuda specific in my case) clients for WUs. Good to know that this Cuda miner is using Berkeley's code. Now only if I could get the damn thing built and running.

      I'm going to just keep mining with bitminter's miner for now. This is becoming extremely rediculous that the only miner I can get to work is one made by a pooling server and can only be used in that pool.

      Sabo

      Delete
  8. Hi Sabo here. Posting from my POS laptop.

    So I found the right BDB (the C/C++ one) installed it. Got further. got an error that it couldnt find the Cuda toolkit. Followed these instructions: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Cuda Got The test started, but the pic display was green (like when watching a video and the video isnt rendering properly. So I switched from the experimental driver I was using to the Version Current and rebooted as it had requested. But now when I boot up all I get is command line; My desktop is gone. I enter the user name and password at the prompts. It logs me in and I have control but only from a commandline interface (in other words, since I dont know the back ends to anything, I dont know how to change any of my settings to change them). Essentially my system is hosed and Im going to have to reinstall Ubuntu and reconfigure it the way I want it. That also means Im going to lose all the data on my linux partition (including my wallet which I had almost a buck worth of bitcoin in from mining with the shitty OpenCL miner from bitminter). Unless I can find some help in recovering my system. I tried the recovery mode and did fix broken packages, and tried the graphical safemode, but it wouldnt boot.

    When I boot I get: Ubuntu 12.04.2 LTS (Computer Name) ttyl

    (computer name) login
    (I enter user name)
    (Ask for password)
    (I enter password)
    Last login: Mon Mar 25 09:07:05 MDT 12013 onttyl
    Welcome to Ubuntu 12.04.2 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.2.0-39-generic X86_64)
    * Documentation: https://help.ubuntu.com/

    0 packages can be updated
    o updates are security updates

    USER@COMPUTERNAME:~$

    I also had a bunch of update requests from the update manager. I allowed them, and they requested a reboot.

    Please help. this fucking sucks and I am pissed. I am going to look around and ask on the Ubuntu forums for help as well. But since youve been able to help me somewhat, I started here first.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hello.
      Well this is unfortunate.
      Have you tried "startx" ? Normally this starts the GUI (check http://askubuntu.com/questions/168736/how-to-start-gui-from-command-line)

      Have you tried removing the installed driver?

      I am quite busy for this week, but I am asking around friends to see if they use CUDA/nVidia for mining. I might be able to dig out some old nVidia cards I have and try mining with them myself. This will however only happen next week, earliest.

      Delete
    2. I booted up into my live cd and transferred my home folder over to my data partition and am rebuilding (customizing) my linux partition as it was before I changed drivers. I did some searching to find a fix before I reinstalled, but I couldnt find any; got impatient and so decided to just reinstall. I kinda wish I hadnt cause I had my system just the way I wanted it. Now I cant even get my BOINC manager executable to launch (but the bitcoin executable works) and I checked my home folder to make sure it had my .bitcoin folder in it and the wallet.dat when I moved it over to my data drive. But I dont think it moved over and so I think I lost the few bitcoins I did mine with the bitminter. I only had 0.0084 so its not much of a loss, but still sucks.

      Ill attempt a cuda miner some time next week after getting my system the way it was before. I dont understand why BOINC wont launch though. doesnt make any sense.

      I appriciate the help with the cuda miner. You figure out how, let me know.

      Sabo

      Delete
    3. I had some time recently and found this:
      http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1625433
      This is an official guide and includes links to CUDA drivers etc. and also walks through the entire installation process

      If you are sure that the proper CUDA driver is installed, there is a quick guide on Bitcointalk.org to configure rpcmienr that might help:
      https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2444.220

      I really hope this helps you.
      Or did you manage to get it working by now?

      Delete
  9. Why are you manually adding URIs to sources.list instead of using apt-add-repository? Messing with sources.list is so 1990s

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's just personal preference to edit sources.list. Of course, you can do it either way, gives the same result.

      Delete
  10. Guys. As someone with over 25 yrs of UNIX/Linux knowledge.
    (yes, I used to work for Ma when it was hatching/killing UNIX.)
    1) stick to the command line. It's safer, and forces you to remember your commands. Yes, I run X, and can configure it, but still do my important stuff in a cmd window.
    2) why are you doing this on your primary system? THAT's insanity!
    3) good luck.

    ReplyDelete