Bitok - 0.3.19 Mainnet What if Bitcoin had stayed CPU-mineable with complete Satoshi-era codebase? No features added. No ideology injected. No attempt to "fix" Bitcoin according to modern tastes.
Bitcoin v0.3.19 from 2010 was the last release under Satoshi's direct involvement. Everything after that is history. Not destiny.
I've been running an experiment - the original v0.3.19 codebase. The same rules. The same behavior. One major change: a mining algorithm that GPUs and ASICs can't easily dominate. All critical security fixes in place from day one. Adapted only as much as required to run on modern operating systems and **resist GPU mining**.
The main change is replacing SHA-256 with Yespower for proof-of-work. It's memory-hard, so GPUs don't have much advantage. Anyone with a laptop can mine. I think that's how it was supposed to be.
A block explorer for Bitok is now available at bitokd.run Bitok itself does not maintain address or transaction indexes, consistent with early Bitcoin design. The explorer operates using a separate external indexer that parses the blockchain sequentially and builds its own database for inspection purposes.
SpecificationsAlgorithm: Yespower 1.0 (N=2048, r=32) pers="BitokPoW"
Block time: 10 minutes
Block reward: 50 BITOK
Halving: every 210,000 blocks
Max supply: 21,000,000
Difficulty adjust: every 2016 blocks
Coinbase maturity: 100 blocks
P2P port: 18333
RPC port: 8332
Same economics as Bitcoin. 21 million coins, halving every 4 years, etc.
Downloads (latest)Version
0.3.19.7:
https://github.com/elvisjedusor/bitok/releases/tag/0.3.19.7Windows (64-bit):
-
bitok-0.3.19.7-win64.zip - GUI + daemon
Linux:
-
bitok-gui-0.3.19.7-linux-x86_64.tar.gz - GUI (AppImage portable)
-
bitokd-static-0.3.19.7-linux-x86_64.tar.gz - daemon only
Macos (Intel-based) :
-
bitok-macos-x86_64.zip - GUI
-
bitokd-macos-x86_64.zip - daemon only
Macos (Apple Silicon) :
-
bitok-macos-arm64.zip - GUI
-
bitokd-macos-arm64.zip - daemon only
Source:
https://github.com/elvisjedusor/bitok6b8e6f9905e8132ef261c7e8cc0e306bb9030f0a065019646defce52399829d3 bitok-0.3.19.7-win64.zip
0db142437ec3157a719f320763abbad5843dff4878222d02a596cf7036bc7395 bitokd-macos-arm64.zip
d55930ccc3e13f12be630eab7aa2712535e01fbb7845d0a12f9a7356e6aa8540 bitokd-macos-x86_64.zip
59d63df0634586c385ff51c704b22c3f3a0ce743365b3e31c54d059aa0f5d388 bitokd-static-0.3.19.7-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
9b632109ae9f75ad73416180452cf5a1e9261e031b0e31c4bb211025c642ea6b bitok-gui-0.3.19.7-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
a7ea2b9a320402dacf4c14aee6434df2966d2d945f7903b591100df03293eee4 bitok-macos-arm64.zip
a69e0b6685f9d1cf00d86962316d94dbfaaf6b57f6a0047793efe39d00fa21f8 bitok-macos-x86_64.zip
Mining./bitokd -gen # mine on all cores
./bitokd -gen -genproclimit=4 # limit to 4 cores
In the GUI: Settings > Options > Generate Coins
No pools needed. Your CPU is enough to find blocks, at least for now while the network is small. The algorithm automatically uses SSE2/AVX/AVX2 if your CPU supports it.
RunningJust extract and run. It connects to other nodes through IRC bootstrap, same as early Bitcoin did. No configuration file needed - everything is command line flags if you want to change defaults.
Data goes in:
- Windows: %APPDATA%\Bitok\
- Linux: ~/.bitok/
- macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Bitok/
What changed from original BitcoinThree things:
1. Build system updated for modern compilers (OpenSSL 3.x, Boost 1.74+, GCC 11+, wxWidgets 3.2)
2. SHA-256 replaced with Yespower 1.0 for proof-of-work
3. New genesis block so it's a separate network
That's it. The transaction format, script system, networking, wallet - all the same as v0.3.19. All the security fixes from that version are included (value overflow protection, DoS limits, etc).
Genesis blockHash: 0x0290400ea28d3fe79d102ca6b7cd11cee5eba9f17f2046c303d92f65d6ed2617
Message: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks"
nBits: 0x1effffff
nNonce: 37137
There was discussion back in 2010 about GPU mining. The concern was that GPUs would eventually take over and regular users wouldn't be able to participate anymore. That's exactly what happened with Bitcoin.
Yespower is memory-hard (~128KB per hash). GPUs have lots of cores but limited memory bandwidth per core, so they can't get much speedup. It keeps things fair for CPU miners.
I'm not saying GPUs will never work. Someone clever enough might figure something out. But it raises the barrier significantly.
What this is notThis isn't trying to replace Bitcoin or compete with it. Bitcoin exists and has gone its own way.
This is just the old code, running as its own thing. If you're curious what Bitcoin was like in 2010, or you want to mine something with your laptop, here it is.
No promises about price or adoption. If it's useful to people, they'll use it. If not, they won't.
SecurityThis is code from 2010. The crypto is fine (ECDSA, SHA-256 for non-mining hashes), but the codebase doesn't have 14 years of additional hardening that modern Bitcoin has.
Back up your wallet.dat. If you lose it, the coins are gone. There's no recovery.
Links- GitHub:
https://github.com/elvisjedusor/bitok- Technical docs:
https://github.com/elvisjedusor/bitok/blob/master/RPC_API.md- Build instructions:
https://github.com/elvisjedusor/bitok/blob/master/BUILD_UNIX.mdLicenseMIT, same as original Bitcoin.
---
It's Bitcoin, but not Bitcoin. It's new, but also old.If you don't get it, that's fine. Run it or don't. The software does what it does regardless.
