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forest 2021-02-25 17:39:11 -06:00
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@ -457,7 +457,7 @@ forest@thingpad:~/Desktop/git/sequentialread-pow-captcha$ sha256sum LICENSE.md
It's impossible to tell how the hash will be affected by changing the input... Well, unless you calculate the hash!
This is related to the famous [Halting Problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem) from computer science.
PoW is a game which exploits these interesting properties of hash functions. It works like this: I give you a file, and then you have to change the file (Add `a`s at the end, increment a number in the file, whatever you want to do) and recalculate the hash each time you change it, until you find a hash which ends in two zeros in a row. Or three zeros in a row, or four, whatever. Since there are 16 possible values for each character, each additional required zero divides your likelhood of finding the "winning" hash by 16.
PoW is a game which exploits these interesting properties of hash functions. It works like this: I give you a file, and then you have to change the file (Add "`a`"s at the end, increment a number in the file, whatever you want to do) and recalculate the hash each time you change it, until you find a hash which ends in two zeros in a row. Or three zeros in a row, or four, whatever. Since there are 16 possible values for each character, each additional required zero divides your likelhood of finding the "winning" hash by 16.
This is exactly how Bitcoin mining works, Bitcoin requires miners to search for SHA256 hashes that end in a rediculously unlikely number of zeros, like flipping 100 coins and getting 100 heads in a row.