7 ms·

Realtime Bitcoin webGL globe – visualizing all transactions and blocks

53 points by askmike 13y ago

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
mike_hearn 13y ago
Doesn't work for me unfortunately, I see no textures and a lot of errors like this: WebGL: INVALID_VALUE: texImage2D: width or height out of range [.WebGLRenderingContext]RENDER WARNING: texture bound to texture unit 0 is not renderable. It maybe non-power-of-2 and have incompatible texture filtering or is not 'texture complete' This is on a retina MacBook Pro. I guess there's some hw incompatibility there.
- askmike 13y ago
  Darn, I also had this on Firefox. For non WebKit browser I already use a lower res texture. What browser did you use?
  - mike_hearn 13y ago
    Chrome 32. Globe texture shows up in Firefox though it's a little choppy.
- Tmmrn 13y ago
  Works fine on intel and radeonsi in linux in firefox nightly and chromium. In firefox the textures are noticeably darker for some reason.
  - askmike 13y ago
    On firefox I ran into the out_of_range error with the clear image used in WebKit browser. So on Gecko browsers I load a smaller image (which is a bit darker).
- mrdoob2 13y ago
  Should be now fixed.
mike_hearn 13y ago
Other feedback: I suspect there aren't really tons of transactions being relayed out of costa rica - is this possibly the origin point on your globe model or something? Are you filtering out transactions with no geocodable IP? Really cool visualisation anyway. Like it!
- askmike 13y ago
  I am currently unable to host a big node myself so I am relying on Bitcoincharts and the relay IP they detect. All transactions coming from Bitcoincharts itself (the wallet service) have the localhost IP (127.0.0.1). After being unable to find out where the company is based I've choosen to translate that IP to their main website IP (which is hosted in Costa Rica). If anybody knows where Blockchain.info is based please let me know and I'll fix those transaction locations.
arscan 13y ago
Great stuff. Where do you get the data? I'm working on a geolocation-centric visualization in webgl that would be a good fit for this kind of realtime(ish) data.
- askmike 13y ago
  Thanks! All transaction and block data is from Blockchain.info (https://blockchain.info/api/api_websocket https://blockchain.info/api/api_websocket) (you can also get that from the Bitcoin network itself pretty easily) and all geo location data (ip to geo) is from freegeoip.net. All data is proxied through my own server, so I'm not hammering those services.
gelutu 13y ago
Don't make the cubes green.
- askmike 13y ago
  I think they nicely represent my design skills. I'm all open for suggestions, what did you have in mind? In the next version I want to color them on transaction volume (combined with square sizes).
- jboggan 13y ago
  Orange or gold will complement against the blue/green background, especially when you are popping/zooming out. They get lost in the background when the view pulls out.
  - askmike 13y ago
    I've now turned them orange, which improves the visibility a ton. Though I want to fix the lighting and color them based on variables instead of making them so plain as they are now.
ionwake 13y ago
A new competitor I see? ;) I developed the same code base to do the same thing a month ago. It also front paged on Hackernews (http://www.earthbit.net http://www.earthbit.net ). I guess the main difference is you're using your own proxy for the queries, which is sturdier than a third party. A worthwhile improvement as mine crashed under the load last time = )
- askmike 13y ago
  Ah I knew I could not be the first one to come up with this idea. Nice to see an alternative as well! I love the sounds you added. I like the fact that I provide all data for the website myself, though I'm not in a position to buy a lot of servers. So let's hope this one will hold :) FYI: Your normal globe wasn't loading for me, I am seeing the same error that bothered my version as well. That is until @mrdoob pointed me to the error: https://twitter.com/mrdoob/status/429292386611511296 https://twitter.com/mrdoob/status/429292386611511296
- bachback 13y ago
  merger? both are pretty damn cool.
siculars 13y ago
Right, so these are basically the ip addresses of the bitcoind nodes that are the entry point into the bitcoin network. They are not the addresses of the end users who are transacting in BTC. Correct?
- mappum 13y ago
  You are partly correct. The IP is the node who first told Blockchain.info (assuming that's what this is using) about the transaction. The "entry point" to the network would be when the person sending first transmits it. There is no way to be sure where a transaction came from, but if you have data about how long it took to reach parts of the network, you can make an educated guess (which becomes more accurate if you have more connections/nodes). Some people specifically add Blockchain.info to their peer list, but that is bad for anonymity since all your transactions will then list your real IP in the "relayed by" field.
bbosh 13y ago
This is awesome, but just a small comment about "Next block expected in 7 minutes". The next expected block is always due in 10 minutes, no matter when the previous block was generated. Mining is a memoryless process.
- kaoD 13y ago
  What do you mean? If blocks are 10min apart (actually less as the network hashrate grows before the difficulty adjustment) and the last block was found 3 minutes ago, a new block is expected to be found after 7 more minutes.
  - askmike 13y ago
    The 10 minutes is only an average time at which the network can solve the problem with random tries. You won't see a lot of blocks 10 minutes apart because only when measured over longer timeframes it averages to 10 minutes. Just like when you flip 10 coins they likely won't result in: head - tail - head - tail - (...). Though on average you end up with 5 tails and 5 heads.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - kaoD 13y ago
      > You won't see a lot of blocks 10 minutes apart because only when measured over longer timeframes it averages to 10 minutes. That's why it says expected! To be 100% correct you could plot the cumulative density function as time progresses, but I think just printing the expected time is fine.
  - bbosh 13y ago
    Each hash is essentially an observation of a uniformly distributed variable (hopefully). When you flip a coin, it's heads with probability 1/2 and tails with probability 1/2. The fact that you flipped heads on the first go doesn't change the probabilities. In the same way, the fact that your hash didn't match the difficult on the first go, doesn't change the probability it will match the difficulty on future hashes. So each hash is independent of the attempts you've already made, so there's the same probability of a match at any time step.
gluelogic 13y ago
I believe there is a typo. In the top left corner, it says 'Block mined at location: Unkown'. Shouldn't that be 'unknown'?
- askmike 13y ago
  Thanks, fixed now!
jyz 13y ago
man I was going to start a visualization of blockchain but this is wayy cooler. KUDOS Mike!
- askmike 13y ago
  thanks!
noir_lord 13y ago
I'm watching a real time 3D visualisation of the generation of a distributed unregulated worldwide crypto-currency using the largest network of computers the world has ever seen. Screw it I'm off to the Black Sun for a drink and a sword fight.

53 points by askmike 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

Doesn't work for me unfortunately, I see no textures and a lot of errors like this: WebGL: INVALID_VALUE: texImage2D: width or height out of range [.WebGLRenderingContext]RENDER WARNING: texture bound to texture unit 0 is not renderable. It maybe non-power-of-2 and have incompatible texture filtering or is not 'texture complete' This is on a retina MacBook Pro. I guess there's some hw incompatibility there.

askmike 13y ago
Darn, I also had this on Firefox. For non WebKit browser I already use a lower res texture. What browser did you use?
- mike_hearn 13y ago
  Chrome 32. Globe texture shows up in Firefox though it's a little choppy.
Tmmrn 13y ago
Works fine on intel and radeonsi in linux in firefox nightly and chromium. In firefox the textures are noticeably darker for some reason.
- askmike 13y ago
  On firefox I ran into the out_of_range error with the clear image used in WebKit browser. So on Gecko browsers I load a smaller image (which is a bit darker).
mrdoob2 13y ago
Should be now fixed.

mike_hearn 13y ago

Other feedback: I suspect there aren't really tons of transactions being relayed out of costa rica - is this possibly the origin point on your globe model or something? Are you filtering out transactions with no geocodable IP? Really cool visualisation anyway. Like it!

askmike 13y ago
I am currently unable to host a big node myself so I am relying on Bitcoincharts and the relay IP they detect. All transactions coming from Bitcoincharts itself (the wallet service) have the localhost IP (127.0.0.1). After being unable to find out where the company is based I've choosen to translate that IP to their main website IP (which is hosted in Costa Rica). If anybody knows where Blockchain.info is based please let me know and I'll fix those transaction locations.

arscan 13y ago

Great stuff. Where do you get the data? I'm working on a geolocation-centric visualization in webgl that would be a good fit for this kind of realtime(ish) data.

askmike 13y ago
Thanks! All transaction and block data is from Blockchain.info (https://blockchain.info/api/api_websocket https://blockchain.info/api/api_websocket) (you can also get that from the Bitcoin network itself pretty easily) and all geo location data (ip to geo) is from freegeoip.net. All data is proxied through my own server, so I'm not hammering those services.

gelutu 13y ago

Don't make the cubes green.

askmike 13y ago
I think they nicely represent my design skills. I'm all open for suggestions, what did you have in mind? In the next version I want to color them on transaction volume (combined with square sizes).
jboggan 13y ago
Orange or gold will complement against the blue/green background, especially when you are popping/zooming out. They get lost in the background when the view pulls out.
- askmike 13y ago
  I've now turned them orange, which improves the visibility a ton. Though I want to fix the lighting and color them based on variables instead of making them so plain as they are now.

ionwake 13y ago

A new competitor I see? ;) I developed the same code base to do the same thing a month ago. It also front paged on Hackernews (http://www.earthbit.net http://www.earthbit.net ). I guess the main difference is you're using your own proxy for the queries, which is sturdier than a third party. A worthwhile improvement as mine crashed under the load last time = )

askmike 13y ago
Ah I knew I could not be the first one to come up with this idea. Nice to see an alternative as well! I love the sounds you added. I like the fact that I provide all data for the website myself, though I'm not in a position to buy a lot of servers. So let's hope this one will hold :) FYI: Your normal globe wasn't loading for me, I am seeing the same error that bothered my version as well. That is until @mrdoob pointed me to the error: https://twitter.com/mrdoob/status/429292386611511296 https://twitter.com/mrdoob/status/429292386611511296
bachback 13y ago
merger? both are pretty damn cool.

siculars 13y ago

Right, so these are basically the ip addresses of the bitcoind nodes that are the entry point into the bitcoin network. They are not the addresses of the end users who are transacting in BTC. Correct?

mappum 13y ago
You are partly correct. The IP is the node who first told Blockchain.info (assuming that's what this is using) about the transaction. The "entry point" to the network would be when the person sending first transmits it. There is no way to be sure where a transaction came from, but if you have data about how long it took to reach parts of the network, you can make an educated guess (which becomes more accurate if you have more connections/nodes). Some people specifically add Blockchain.info to their peer list, but that is bad for anonymity since all your transactions will then list your real IP in the "relayed by" field.

bbosh 13y ago

This is awesome, but just a small comment about "Next block expected in 7 minutes". The next expected block is always due in 10 minutes, no matter when the previous block was generated. Mining is a memoryless process.

kaoD 13y ago
What do you mean? If blocks are 10min apart (actually less as the network hashrate grows before the difficulty adjustment) and the last block was found 3 minutes ago, a new block is expected to be found after 7 more minutes.
- askmike 13y ago
  The 10 minutes is only an average time at which the network can solve the problem with random tries. You won't see a lot of blocks 10 minutes apart because only when measured over longer timeframes it averages to 10 minutes. Just like when you flip 10 coins they likely won't result in: head - tail - head - tail - (...). Though on average you end up with 5 tails and 5 heads.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - kaoD 13y ago
    > You won't see a lot of blocks 10 minutes apart because only when measured over longer timeframes it averages to 10 minutes. That's why it says expected! To be 100% correct you could plot the cumulative density function as time progresses, but I think just printing the expected time is fine.
- bbosh 13y ago
  Each hash is essentially an observation of a uniformly distributed variable (hopefully). When you flip a coin, it's heads with probability 1/2 and tails with probability 1/2. The fact that you flipped heads on the first go doesn't change the probabilities. In the same way, the fact that your hash didn't match the difficult on the first go, doesn't change the probability it will match the difficulty on future hashes. So each hash is independent of the attempts you've already made, so there's the same probability of a match at any time step.

gluelogic 13y ago

I believe there is a typo. In the top left corner, it says 'Block mined at location: Unkown'. Shouldn't that be 'unknown'?

askmike 13y ago
Thanks, fixed now!

jyz 13y ago

man I was going to start a visualization of blockchain but this is wayy cooler. KUDOS Mike!

askmike 13y ago
thanks!

noir_lord 13y ago

I'm watching a real time 3D visualisation of the generation of a distributed unregulated worldwide crypto-currency using the largest network of computers the world has ever seen. Screw it I'm off to the Black Sun for a drink and a sword fight.