Coin World News Report:
In the field of cryptocurrency, miners and full nodes are two crucial entities that play important roles in maintaining the integrity, security, and functionality of blockchain networks. Although many people often confuse the two, their functions have significant differences. Therefore, understanding these differences is essential for a deep understanding of the cryptocurrency world.
What is a miner?
In the cryptocurrency field, miners can be compared to gold miners in the real world. They sift through vast lands in search of extremely rare and valuable gold nuggets. Similarly, miners obtain the right to mine by proof of work, adding new blocks to the blockchain and receiving a substantial reward. Miners play a critical role in the blockchain network, as they are responsible for validating new transactions and recording them on the global distributed ledger, known as the blockchain. It is important to emphasize that miners are a type of full node, which means they verify all the rules of the blockchain and only accept blocks that comply with these rules.
The mining process involves transaction validation, block creation, and generating proof of work. Generating valid proof of work means finding a hash output (also known as a hash) that meets the specific conditions specified in the protocol.
Here are simplified steps for miners to generate proof of work:
1. Transaction validation: Miners select transactions from the mempool (a collection of unconfirmed transactions) and verify their validity.
2. Block creation: Validated transactions are combined with the hash of the previous block and a new random number to construct a candidate block.
3. Hash processing: The candidate block is hashed using SHA-256 or other commonly used hash algorithms, generating a fixed-length string representation of the hash value.
4. Difficulty check: The generated hash value is compared with the current mining difficulty target specified by the protocol. If it is smaller than the target value, a new block is successfully mined. If it is not smaller than the target value, the miner changes the random number and repeats the hash processing until a hash value that meets the target is found. Miners use mining hardware or specialized ASIC miners capable of processing trillions of hashes per second in an attempt to find a hash value that meets the target as quickly as possible.
5. Block submission: Once a valid hash value is found, the miner submits the new block to the network. Other nodes validate the block, and if it passes the validation, it is “added” to the blockchain. The miner who submitted the block receives a certain amount of cryptocurrency reward. Finding a valid hash value requires a significant amount of “work” (computational power and energy consumption). This work can be verified by anyone at any time, hence the term “proof of work.”
One of the biggest misconceptions about mining is that it is an easy way to earn cryptocurrency. In reality, the process is resource-intensive and requires advanced hardware, technical knowledge, and a significant amount of electricity. Additionally, there is intense competition among miners, continually squeezing profit margins.
What is a full node?
While all miners are full nodes, not all full nodes are miners. Miners are block producers, while full nodes act as librarians for the blockchain network. Full nodes maintain a complete copy of the blockchain, ensuring that every transaction complies with the network rules. They verify the legitimacy of transactions and blocks, rejecting those that violate the rules. Non-mining full nodes do not create new blocks but play a crucial role in maintaining network integrity by checking the work of miners and ensuring compliance with network consensus rules.
Although full nodes play a critical role, they are often misunderstood. Many people believe that running a full node entails receiving rewards, similar to mining. However, unlike miners, the work of full node operators does not directly earn them rewards. They contribute to maintaining network decentralization and security, and their contribution is largely selfless.
Some also believe that full nodes are powerless participants in the network. Miners produce blocks (at a high cost), while full nodes are the army of supporters for the blockchain, with the authority to enforce network consensus rules. A mining alliance with over 51% of the network’s computational power can choose to produce blocks that violate network consensus rules. However, the risk of doing so is that the stakeholders of the blockchain will essentially reject these blocks, leaving those miners with no rewards.
The balance between miners and non-mining full nodes is also crucial. A network dominated by miners may become centralized, undermining the decentralized nature of blockchain technology. Conversely, a network with too few miners may lower security as it becomes more susceptible to a 51% attack, where a single entity or alliance controls the majority of the mining power and can manipulate the blockchain maliciously.
Summary
In conclusion, understanding the differences between miners and full nodes is crucial for anyone involved in the cryptocurrency world. Although they play different roles, both are indispensable for the operation, security, and integrity of blockchain networks. Miners add new transactions to the blockchain with their powerful computing power, while full nodes maintain network integrity by validating these transactions. Together, they ensure the smooth operation of the blockchain network.
