Chances are that if you've come to Gridcoin you probably already have some understanding about digital currency and how most of it works. Or maybe you have no previous knowledge, but even if you have no clue at all, this tutorial will help you understand the concept of the Gridcoin Network.

Please note that Magnitude, Distributed Proof of Research, Beacons and other terms here do not apply to you if you mine through a pool, read our tutorial on pool mining. This work is done by the pool and your reward is sent to you from the pool.

If you wish to start mining solo, please be aware that it requires a small amount of coins to get started. About 50-100 coins are good for start. The reason for this can be found in the guide.

However, please continue reading if you want to know more about the inner workings of Gridcoin.

The Basics

Gridcoin, as many digital currencies, generates a number of coins produced every day that are for rewarding all those that uphold the network. The network for Gridcoin is held up in two ways. First is Proof of Stake (PoS) and second is Distributed Proof of Research (DPoR). Proof of Stake is not something we will go into in this tutorial. We will on the other hand look on Distributed Proof of Research and why there is no Proof of Work as coins like Bitcoin has.

The Projects of BOINC

Gridcoin is, as said, rewarding for running projects on the BOINC network. But this does not mean you can run any of the many projects. There is a whitelist that current contains 31 different projects, ranging from searching for alien signals to mapping the human genome and mathematical equations. These are the Projects that are verified and trusted. This is done because anyone can start a Project and no one wants a project that is unfair and easy to cheat.

When you do work on BOINC, the projects will give you a credit for your work. The amount is set by the Project and has nothing to do with Gridcoin, but it is used to compare you with all other Gridcoin users. When you have computed work over time you build up a score called RAC, Recent Average Credit. This is the score you and everyone else are compared with.

Whitelisted Projects

Note: A requirement for being compared to others is that you have joined team Gridcoin on the specific project. Without doing so we have no way of knowing how much work you do!

Setting up the client for Solo Mining

If you already haven’t done this before, or have been doing pool mining, there are a few things that you need to attend to before you can advertise yourself on the network.

You have to specify the e-mail address you have used on your BOINC project; this have to be the same on all projects. The wallet will ask you for this on the first start, but you can also do so in the gridcoinresearch.conf file by adding a line like this;

If you did not install BOINC in the default directories you are also required to define these with the following two lines in the same configuration file, with the appropriate paths. These are examples on how it could look like, you should replace with your setup;

Windows (double backslashes are required on windows)

boincdatadir=D:\\ProgramData\\BOINC\\ boincappdir=D:\\Program Files\\BOINC\\

Linux

boincdatadir=/var/lib/boinc-client

or

boincdatadir=/var/lib/boinc

Video Tutorial on installing BOINC and Gridcoin

This video will show you in more detail on how to install BOINC and the Gridcoin wallet. It will also show you a few ways of gaining your initial Gridcoins.

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