Librecrypto

Bitcoin and cryptography related tutorials

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Post Soviet

This morning I woke up early to heavy rain and thunder. It wasn’t even sunrise yet and still dark. I remembered my Blockstream Satellite node’s computer was pretty exposed and probably getting rained on, so I went out to move it so it wouldn’t get ruined; half awake and without coffee. My node currently archives all of the data received by the Satellite API broadcast, so I figured I would check if there was anything interesting it received.

What my node received was what appears to be a journal broadcasted by an anonymous software developer in a “post soviet state” in eastern Europe, who is fascinated by Bitcoin, the Lightning Network, and Blockstream Satellite: 

vyqzbefrsnzqahgdkrsidzigxvrppato$"Z
                                   vW}MTOeu:Hello fellow earthling!

starting bitcoindev from eastern Europe would like some support

bc1q9w6sk3h4xx4hrz59wmjzmlka7vnmk8lhhcnmut

File must
...

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My Satellite API GPG Key

This is grubles’ Blockstream Satellite API GPG public key, which can be used to encrypt data and broadcast it globally (paid for with Lightning) via the Satellite network. 

-----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----
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=1MFL
-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----

My satellite node located at some undisclosed location will receive the data and decrypt it. Feel free to send...

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Using Lightning on MacOS

Spark on MacOS!

Lightning is a layer-2 technology built on top of Bitcoin which allows quick and secure payments. Lightning greatly improves Bitcoin’s usability by enabling very small payments to be processed quickly without having to settle on the base layer, which can take greater than 10 minutes in some instances.

This is a quick written + visual tutorial for Mac users on how to setup all the necessary software to use Spark to make payments with c-lightning. It only takes a few steps with some easily copy/paste-able commands.

Spark: a light but feature-rich Lightning wallet app, built on c-lightning.

c-lightning: one of three major, cross-compatible implementations of the Lightning Network (alongside lnd and eclair), led by Blockstream.

Overview:

1. Download Bitcoin Core .dmg and .tar.gz archives and install
2. Running Bitcoin Core
3. Install Homebrew
4. Install required software with...

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