BitShares Forum

Main => Stakeholder Proposals => Topic started by: startail on July 11, 2017, 05:47:43 pm

Title: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 11, 2017, 05:47:43 pm
Signing on as a BitShares Witness

It's been about a month since I joined the group of witnesses for Steemit, and today I will take another step of signing on as a witness for BitShares.

Ever since I first started to use BitShares, which was shortly after I started to use Steemit, I have enjoyed every minute of it. This open market where you can trade openly without the risk of your assets is a groundbreaking and highly undervalued system.

The main reason I join in as a witness is because I wish to contribute to this wonderful system. Witnesses are conduits between the chain and the many users, it's our responsibility not only to make sure it runs smoothly but also to speak up when it doesn't for the users. We should listen in on the pace of the users on it.

My Steemit Witness Progress
My witness progress on Steem has been very successful so far and I keep witnessing about 10-12 block each day (https://steemdb.com/@sc-steemit/blocks). My setup has been working very well with only two missed blocks so far, one being because I made a typo when I started, the second was a very temporary issue of network connection. All in all a pretty decent four weeks so far. Read My Steemit Witness Intent Post (https://steemit.com/witness/@sc-steemit/intent-to-become-a-witness-of-steemit)

Why me?
I'm an active member of the Gridcoin community and have been running the official blockexplorer for almost a year soon. As I said before I'm also an active witness for Steem and try to the best of my abilities to read up and keep track of changes and updates to the network and read up on the users expectations and wishes. I have my standard and wishes on how things should work, but it's also my obligation to assess the users needs and wishes. I frequently join the Beyond Bitcoin, BitShares and Gridcoin Mumble Hangouts and will do so in the future as well, which is a great place for updates and communication.

I have over 15 years of experience of running servers with various types of applications, this is nothing new to me and I'm quite diverse in ways to make sure things stay running even when I'm not around. My current setup alerts me if any of my systems services goes down or something isn't running, which I plan to keep working and refining on since it's vital that everything keeps running.

The presence of witnesses of BitShares is in my opinion too low; something that was raised in the latest BitShares Mumble session when we started to discuss things about changes that where needed on the network, only one witness was actually joining in. I'm not saying they are not very good witnesses, but we also need witnesses that are joining the crowd and listening in on the phase, something I will do.

In that same way I now wish to become part of the very best cryptocurrency exchange you can find. I will make sure to do my very best to keep it that way.

I like doing tutorials about these things; making the general public aware of the functionailty of systems and how they work.

- Why You Should Go Decentralized All In; A Quick Guide to BitShares DEX (https://steemit.com/bitshares/@sc-steemit/why-you-should-go-decentralized-all-in-a-quick-guide-to-bitshares-dex)
- Quick Introduction to Steemit, or "What the Hell Is This Thing I'm On Now? (https://steemit.com/steemit/@sc-steemit/quick-introduction-to-steemit-or-what-hell-is-this-thing-i-m-on-now)
- Gridcoin Research and BOINC Explained (https://steemit.com/gridcoin/@sc-steemit/eli5-gridcoin-research-and-boinc-explained)
- Gridcoin and Distributed Work on BOINC (https://steemit.com/gridcoin/@sc-steemit/gridcoin-and-distributed-work-on-boinc)

I am well aware that I will not witness any blocks until I reach one of the active witness positions
This doesn't stop me from doing my run for witness and I know that I will eventually, hopefully, be able to contribute to the network that I've grown to love. I will initially use the same setup system that I have for my Steem witness nodes, if it comes to the stage that they are required to run on their own servers I will be quick to react. The current servers are well equiped to handle the extra load of running another witness system.

The Income from Being a Witness
I see many great opportunities for supporting communities or projects; exploring new ways for progress. I wish to support the communities that are close to my heart, but also to expand the horizon of what can be done with cryptocurrency. I see things like Whaleshares by @officialfuzzy as a very inspiring project.

System Setup
I have two witness systems;
- One Main Witness
- One Backup Witness
In case of something happening, the backup witness is standing by. Both these systems run on a 6-core, 24GB Ram, 100% SSD VPS server.

Neither of these nodes are accessible from the outside, they can only witness the blockchain. All to make the systems secure enough.

Price Feed
I will be utilizing the BTS Tools from @wackou
Many thanks for this great tool.

How to vote for me
If you think that I will be suited for a BitShares Witness I would be very happy if you would vote for me. On BitShares my active witness is called @sc-ol

In the BitShares Wallet
1. Click "Account" on the top left
2. Click "Voting" in the left menu (4th in the menu)
3. Click "Witnesses" in the menubar on the voting page
4. Type in "sc-ol" in the textfield and press "Add"

Thank you for your support and trust!
I hope I can gain your trust in becoming one of the nodes on the witness list that You trust and rely on.

My BitShares Witness Proposal on Steemit (https://steemit.com/bitshares/@sc-steemit/joining-in-as-bitshares-witness)
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: R on July 11, 2017, 06:54:40 pm
Great to see you take on the challenge of becoming a Bitshares witness, you've 100% got my vote! You've already displayed your ability to run a steem witness & have been running several gridcoin nodes for the gridcoin blockchain explorer you created (primary gridcoin explorer).
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: fav on July 12, 2017, 05:31:03 am
I see you just joined the forum, welcome.

are you connected to the other witnesses? what's your telegram name?
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 12, 2017, 09:58:39 am
I see you just joined the forum, welcome.

are you connected to the other witnesses? what's your telegram name?

I've actually been registered since August last year, but I haven't actually posted anything until now. The whole thing about BitShares eluded me in the beginning and I wasn't really sure how to use it, but in March (I think it was) I registered this account on the BitShares platform and started using it much more at learned a lot.

To keep in touch with other witnesses and or they with me I'm available:
- on Telegram as "startail" in both the "BitShares Dex" and "OpenLedgerDC" channels, and also in the "Gridcoin" channel.
- on Steemit as "sc-steemit" watching the BitShares tags
- on the BitShares mailing list for witnesses, announcements and critical.
- on the BitShares forum (here)
- on Whaleshares Discord channels
- on Slack, Team Gridcoin channels

I regularly keep an out on these places as well as the GitHub Repo for updates and changes in the releases.

How I think I can contribute
- I will write guides and tutorials on other platforms like Steemit
- I will be of general assistance for others as much as I can
- I will use the skills in programming that I have to utilize and propose additions to the existing tools

 I'm here for you and will gladly try to answer any questions regarding my proposal for being a witness
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: sahkan on July 14, 2017, 03:18:05 am
Welcome!

2 nodes is good to start with, seems that we have a shortage of the FULL nodes because there is no incentive to run them. Would you consider running a FULL node with secure websocket access for the light wallets? (Mine runs at 30GB RAM and it has been growing quite fast so you need at least 64GB server). If YES, then you will have my vote!
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 14, 2017, 07:20:39 pm
Welcome!

2 nodes is good to start with, seems that we have a shortage of the FULL nodes because there is no incentive to run them. Would you consider running a FULL node with secure websocket access for the light wallets? (Mine runs at 30GB RAM and it has been growing quite fast so you need at least 64GB server). If YES, then you will have my vote!

Yes, it's a good start and the minimum I should be doing really :)
If Full nodes is something the community lacks I would surely be looking into making one available soon.

I'm also very interested in the BitShares Block Explorer project. It's a shame that this great community only has one, lately very unstable, block explorer. I'm sure the person running it is doing the very best to make sure it runs good, but there is a need for more flavors on the map. Look at the Steem community, they have a whole ton of different miner variations that aren't a full block explorer but rather niches on things. I hope we can look in to expanding this community with more various tools.
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 17, 2017, 04:10:59 pm
As @sahkan posted before, there has been a need for FULL Nodes.
Today I've officially started up my full node.

Full Node Specs:
- 10-core Intel® Xeon® E5-2620v3 or E5-2630v4 processor
- 52GB RAM
- 1Gigabit unmetered traffic

It can be accessed trough
Code: [Select]
wss://bitshares.crypto.fans/ws
I've also started to work on a forked modification of @roelandp's Python monitoring script (https://github.com/roelandp/Bitshares-Witness-Monitor) to keep track of the witness status.
I will add a few more functions with the support that the Python libraries for Bitshares, Steem and PeerPlays gives to make it a one-stop witness monitoring script.
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: paliboy on July 18, 2017, 09:51:46 am
Awesome news! Consider adding your full node to BitShares UI https://github.com/bitshares/bitshares-ui/blob/bitshares/web/app/api/apiConfig.js
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 18, 2017, 06:01:11 pm
Awesome news! Consider adding your full node to BitShares UI https://github.com/bitshares/bitshares-ui/blob/bitshares/web/app/api/apiConfig.js

It has been added to PR #195 (https://github.com/bitshares/bitshares-ui/pull/195)
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: sahkan on July 18, 2017, 06:22:17 pm
Voted!
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on July 18, 2017, 08:13:22 pm
Next task, that I think I should look at, is to look at price feeds.

Are there any assets that needs extra witnesses running price feeds?
As a non-block producing witness so far it doesn't make any sense for me to start publishing price feeds for anything, if I've understood this correct.
I might start to publish some feeds, just for the sake of it, but I need to set up a good price-feed script for that.

Anyhow, if anyone thinks I should post any specific price feeds, just give me a shout out here or on the Whaleshares Discord or Team Gridcoin Slack channels as I'm always in either of them.
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: R on July 19, 2017, 02:34:06 pm
Next task, that I think I should look at, is to look at price feeds.

Are there any assets that needs extra witnesses running price feeds?
As a non-block producing witness so far it doesn't make any sense for me to start publishing price feeds for anything, if I've understood this correct.
I might start to publish some feeds, just for the sake of it, but I need to set up a good price-feed script for that.

Anyhow, if anyone thinks I should post any specific price feeds, just give me a shout out here or on the Whaleshares Discord or Team Gridcoin Slack channels as I'm always in either of them.
Perhaps HERO, ALTCAP.XDR and HERTZ (in the future)? There are MPAs which accept price feeds from non-wittness/committee users, however you may need to request permission to do so.
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: startail on October 18, 2017, 07:36:19 pm
Thought it would be time to post some update on my projects and progress on BitShares.

My witness node is running, eager to witness some blocks 
With a backup node available, I'm well prepared. Both my witness nodes have been stable, running continuously since the setup of them in July. They are sharing resources with my Steem witnesses currently, and presently aren't in any need of extra resources. If this would show to be an issue, I'll put them on separate servers.

I'm participating in the Testnet, as I think an effective witness should do so. Joining on the testnet helps me test some things before going serious (which I hope to be soon) as well as learning about new things in the development as they are available. My testnet node has performed well, and I'm confident my system can handle the primary network.

My Access node, which has been included in the wallet since a few months now, are running stable without any issues. It's available trough bitshares.crypto.fans, which is also the address for seed-node access as well.

I'm looking forward to the new HF at the end of November, where we have a solution for the Black Swan events, among other things. I'm also keeping track of the updates on the BitShares Wallet, which I actively write about on Steemit to make more people aware of the wallet and what the network can do.

I'm also trying to make posts regarding issues, as well as tutorials on how to do things on the BitShares network. Next up will most likely be a tutorial on Margin trading that I've been writing on.

As of current, I haven't done much work on market price updates for assets, as I'm not an active witness. I’m all ears to support an MPA or SmartCoin that doesn’t require an active witness for price feeds, just contact me, and I would be happy to talk about it.

I'm present on the BitShares Witness Telegram channel, as well as here and Steemit.

My Update on Steemit: https://steemit.com/bitshares/@sc-steemit/bitshares-witness-and-developer-update
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: renkcub on October 19, 2017, 08:43:59 pm

I’m all ears to support an MPA or SmartCoin that doesn’t require an active witness for price feeds, just contact me, and I would be happy to talk about it.

I'm present on the BitShares Witness Telegram channel, as well as here and Steemit.


Howdy!

Check out my thread on https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587)

I'm pushing for creation of BitETH and BitZEC as new smartcoins. I'd like them to be eventually adopted by "official" witnesses, but not sure of the mechanism for that. What are your thoughts?

Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: R on October 20, 2017, 10:16:04 pm

I’m all ears to support an MPA or SmartCoin that doesn’t require an active witness for price feeds, just contact me, and I would be happy to talk about it.

I'm present on the BitShares Witness Telegram channel, as well as here and Steemit.


Howdy!

Check out my thread on https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587)

I'm pushing for creation of BitETH and BitZEC as new smartcoins. I'd like them to be eventually adopted by "official" witnesses, but not sure of the mechanism for that. What are your thoughts?

In the current pre-bsip-0018 state of the network, crypto based smartcoins (MPAs) are vulnerable to global settlement ('black swan') events, once the BTS network has hard-forked to include bsip-0018 at the end of november, such assets will be more plausible for the long term.

That said, there's more interesting MPAs out there especially in the Algorithm Based Asset category of MPAs, IMO.

Keep it real,
CM.
Title: Re: [Witness Proposal] Joining in as BitShares Witness as "sc-ol"
Post by: renkcub on October 22, 2017, 09:26:50 pm

I’m all ears to support an MPA or SmartCoin that doesn’t require an active witness for price feeds, just contact me, and I would be happy to talk about it.

I'm present on the BitShares Witness Telegram channel, as well as here and Steemit.


Howdy!

Check out my thread on https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587 (https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php/topic,25083.msg311587.html#msg311587)

I'm pushing for creation of BitETH and BitZEC as new smartcoins. I'd like them to be eventually adopted by "official" witnesses, but not sure of the mechanism for that. What are your thoughts?

In the current pre-bsip-0018 state of the network, crypto based smartcoins (MPAs) are vulnerable to global settlement ('black swan') events, once the BTS network has hard-forked to include bsip-0018 at the end of november, such assets will be more plausible for the long term.

That said, there's more interesting MPAs out there especially in the Algorithm Based Asset category of MPAs, IMO.

Keep it real,
CM.


Good comment. I have heard about pending Black Swan improvements but don't know the details.

What more interesting MPAs are you speaking about (in the meantime, at least - as I think alt/smartcoins or a better alternative to UIAs and counterparty risk are totally crucial to Bitshares...)