An important step to take, before any request for proposals (RFP) can be put up, is to gather feedback from users who have interacted with the software for a while now. Many members have been part of the software process since testnet went up, so the hope is to gather constructive and realistic expectations in this thread that can serve to guide developers about perceptions and actual usage of the software. This thread will be an open and evolving thread of practical ideas that will help improve the Decred software. Good ideas gathered from here that will have maximum impact (and are practically attainable) will then be voted on informally to get an idea of what users want, which can then help developers understand the use of the software better. Do not be afraid to voice frustration with the software you've experienced, but let's turn that into something constructive and find a practical way to improve on it. The RFPs will end up making Decred better and that is where the development subsidy goes. As the network churns and grows, the development expands. This is the first step in that process.
This is the part that will decide if biggest features of Decred will make it successful or not. Thanks for this. My suggestion is that first of all to develop the basic GUI wallet which almost everyone wants before putting in more features in the wallet. This way it would be easy for everyone to use any critical feature like voting in the future or to create a guide.
Speaking as a member of the community and as a user of the software, I'll throw my hat in there. I think it's super clear we need native GUIs - in order of preference for development: (1) Windows, (2) OS X, and (3) Linux. For those who may not be aware, Paymetheus for Decred is on the way, but we'll need to shine that up and it's for Windows. But that's an idea I'd like to share. The other idea I'd like to put out there is a network dashboard. I think people feel a big disconnect to command-line interface software, and we can bridge that gap with a GUI. I think the same principle applies to the network, and a web dashboard can do wonders there as well. So something like this interface is quite nice and could work well for Decred.
1). I would like a CUDA miner. I am willing to learn to put it together and compile it. I just need a lead to help out-line packages and dependences. 2) i would like to work on a PoS GUI , if the wallets will do most of it, still i would like to make it my way. 3) Start a business dev thread On models.
I completely agree about the dashboard idea, you need lots of info to make an informed decision and to see problems/failures. Although it should be free of jargon like the one you linked or at least have on hover tips to explain things. Also such dashboard should include pool hashrate distribution. I know this is hard to get 100% accounting of net hash but it is possible. My idea is that apart from rare big hardfork for new feature decisions PoS voting should work as nethash distribution balancing system. A basic GUI that allows people to see if PoW hash is properly distributed or not and set parameters via GUI that will set votebits such that pools/miner remain honest. For example, it should allow to set parameters for blocksize, pool as % of network etc before automatic vote on a block is done. As i write this i think this will be hard/impossible to implement and dangerous if people dont set there params right but its sounds cool
The GUI is a huge thing, obviously. I would like to see Decred take advantage of the split-executable model that it's already got, and possibly set up a peer-to-peer network, where the line between a wallet interface and a Full Node is made even more clear. Similar to the Masternode model which Dash uses, I'm thinking of a system where the wallet is intended to be run "stand-alone," and can try to connect to the network without having to be told which instance of dcrd it should connect to. The user can still specify their own node for added security, but doesn't have to. The example use case for this is someone I tried to get to accept Bitcoin donations to her Twitch channel, but she was turned off by the fact that all of the secure options I sent her involved system-intensive executables. Another feature I think would be beneficial is to have the wallet and server act as webservers, so that you can connect to and interact with them via browser, similar to how the CUPS server on Linux works. A third feature I would like to see is to have the software help remind users how to set it up. When I was writing my tutorial, I was a little frustrated at all of the "magic numbers" that took the form of connection ports. If I hadn't gotten port numbers from the developers, I would not have known where to look to find them. Having the IP and port number appear in the console at startup or allowing the user to specify listening ports in the configuration files would have been very helpful.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you mean, but the software already does all of this: For example, you can get the ports from the help: Code: $ dcrd -h /rpclisten: Add an interface/port to listen for RPC connections (default port: 9109, testnet: 19109) And, when you start it, it's logged: Code: 12:01:46 2016-02-08 [INF] RPCS: RPC server listening on [::1]:9109 12:01:46 2016-02-08 [INF] RPCS: RPC server listening on 127.0.0.1:9109 There is also the sample-dcrd.conf that acts as a configuration file example.
thanks for the link I saw him testing on suprnova a day or 2 ago but then there was no binary release. I will link this in my guide
basic GUI Wallet , to let everyone send and receive dcr freely and easily and avoid all headache command line .
I also second this. Itll also make the coin much more attractive to new users as there hasn't been too much development from the public sector yet.
Can you add my request to lower the confirm time from 256 blocks to 100 or even 50 blocks when PoS voting starts? Also to allow fee to be set instead of fixed at 0.05 Thanks
1. I'm afraid to PoS mine my DCR. In testnet, I staked with some command line to maintain balance x and max price y, but it was not intuitively clear where my 'coins' were. When shutting down, re-starting, I was afraid I may have lost the 'coins' I staked. Would like to have a simple GUI that allows PoS mining, with an intuitive tracking of locked coins (so I can see they're not just gone). Also some intuitive understanding of what I've chosen to vote on and how I'm voting. 2. An iPhone and Android app. Something to gift Decred to family/friends that's super easy and doesn't require they don't clear their cache, etc.
Existing commands to be finished and more to be included around staking. Better documentation around what a command does and returns. For e.g. getreceivedbyaccount returns an extremely high amount, yet I don't actually have them coins... Another e.g. listtransactions is limited to showing the last 10 transactions, the documentation says there is a configuration to specify how many transactions to show but this does not appear to be implemented. A command to display all locked coins, currently the only way I can guess my balance is by getting tickets, counting the hashes, multiplying that by two and adding that to getbalance; clearly this won't work once the ticket prices change. The most important feature will be proper documentstion, either in the help command or on the wiki.
I think it would be great if there was an intentionally basic GUI, which just had menus of actions that can be taken, and plain language documentation to describe what those actions do, and why they might be done. Using an action would then construct commands in text form that could be executed in the GUI or on the command line. That way, there's a GUI which is quick to build, and it would also help teach people about all the features that have been built. Otherwise, it's hard to learn about it all, and sometimes it can feel risky to try out functionality if it's not clear exactly what it will do.
One thing that would be nice is the ability to make more then one payment without having to wait an eternity for the money to "come back."
I believe you can do (assuming --terminal): sendmany default {"<address>":<amount>,"<address>":<amount>}
Nice to hear Paymetheus is on the way. I really like the name coming from Prometheus by the way. We all agree a GUI wallet that works properly will make more people involve with Decred. That's a very nice interface. A mining calculator will be helpful too. Except from software, I believe it will be better to add more things on https://www.decred.org/ homepage in a way to encourage and motivate people to engage with Decred. And since there are a lot of answers inside the forum, a more visible redirection link will be better I think.