The bitcoin network is a peer-to-peer payment network that operates on a cryptographic protocol. Users send and receive bitcoins, the units of currency, by broadcasting digitally signed messages to the network using bitcoin cryptocurrency wallet software. Transactions are recorded into a distributed, replicated public database known as the blockchain, with consensus achieved by a proof-of-work system called mining. Satoshi Nakamoto, the designer of bitcoin claimed that design and coding of bitcoin began in 2007. The project was released in 2009 as open source software. The network requires the minimal structure to share transactions. An ad hoc decentralized network of volunteers is sufficient. Messages are broadcast on a best effort basis, and nodes can leave and rejoin the network at will. Upon reconnection, a node downloads and verifies new blocks from other nodes to complete its local copy of the blockchain. A bitcoin is defined by a sequence of digitally signed transactions that began with the bitcoin's creation, as a block reward. The owner of a bitcoin transfers it by digitally signing it over to the next owner using a bitcoin transaction, much like endorsing a traditional bank check. A payee can examine each previous transaction to verify the chain of ownership. Unlike traditional check endorsements, bitcoin transactions are irreversible, which eliminates the risk of chargeback fraud. Although it is possible to handle bitcoins individually, it would be unwieldy to require a separate transaction for every bitcoin in a transaction. Transactions are therefore allowed to contain multiple inputs and outputs, allowing bitcoins to be split and combined. Common transactions will have either a single input from a larger previous transaction or multiple inputs combining smaller amounts, and one or two outputs: one for the payment, and one returning the change, if any, to the sender. Any difference between the total input and output amounts of a transaction goes to miners as a transaction fee. In 2013, Mark Gimein estimated electricity consumption to be about 40.9 megawatts (982 megawatt-hours a day). In 2014, Hass McCook estimated 80.7 megawatts (80,666 kW). As of 2015, The Economist estimated that even if all miners used modern facilities, the combined electricity consumption would be 166.7 megawatts (1.46 terawatt-hours per year). To lower the costs, bitcoin miners have set up in places like Iceland where geothermal energy is cheap and cooling Arctic air is free. Chinese bitcoin miners are known to use hydroelectric power in Tibet to reduce electricity costs. Various potential attacks on the bitcoin network and its use as a payment system, real or theoretical, have been considered. The bitcoin protocol includes several features that protect it against some of those attacks, such as unauthorized spending, double spending, forging bitcoins, and tampering with the blockchain. Other attacks, such as theft of private keys, require due care by users.
Grin coin is a private & lightweight open source project based on the mimblewimble blockchain implementation. MimbleWimble is a lightweight blockchain protocol proposed by anonymous author that goes by the name Tom Elvis Jedusor (inspired by Harry Potter) in July 2016. Since then, the proposal has gained a huge following among Bitcoin and privacy advocates. Unlike bitcoin or ethereum, there are no addresses in Grin. In order to transact using Grin, both wallets must communicate with each other online with the results broadcasted to the network. Another key different is that transaction history (sender, receiver, amount) will not be recorded on the blockchain. Due to the removal of these information from the transaction, the data size remains small and that keeps the blockchain lightweight. New nodes can easily join the network without having to download a large blockchain. Grin coin was launched without an ICO, fundraising, or pre-mine. Developers around the world contribute openly with the goal to ensure the coin distribution remains as fair as possible. There are 2 popular wallets widely available to interact with the Grin network. Grin core wallet: https://www.coingecko.com/buzz/how-to-use-grin-wallet-to-send-receive-grin-coins Wallet713: https://www.coingecko.com/buzz/how-to-use-grin-wallet713-to-send-and-receive-grin-coin-step-by-step-guide The consensus algorithm used by Grin is the Cuckoo Cycle proof-of-work based. There are 2 hashing algorithms involved with Grin. Cuckoo-29 is meant for GPU mining while Cuckoo-31 is meant fo ASIC mining. This is a deliberate design to encourage miners to eventually move into ASIC mining for efficiency while keeping it fair at the beginning of the launch. Grin coin has launched its mainnet on 15th January 2019 and is now available for mining and trading.