8

I'm guessing that vanitygen is more strict or has different rules than production's Base58 rules.

Why are some of thse names marked not possible?

C:\vanitygen>oclvanitygen -k -o gpukeystestout.txt -i -f gpukeystest.txt  -T
Prefix 'mdemo1' not possible
Prefix 'mcoin' not possible
Prefix 'mBITname' not possible
Prefix 'mBITclear' not possible
Prefix 'mBITnic' not possible
Prefix 'mbotarmy' not possible
Prefix 'mdmzlist' not possible
Prefix 'maker7' not possible
Prefix 'makerofthings7' not possible
Prefix 'meventvwr' not possible
Prefix 'mdmzadmin' not possible
Next match difficulty: 5908459 (15 prefixes)
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1 Answer 1

8

The rules are the same, but the available range is different. In the testnet the address prefix is 111 (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_address_prefixes).

To deduce the address you write in base58 the prefix concatenated with a 160 bit (20 bytes) hash of the public address and a checksum of 4 bytes (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Technical_background_of_Bitcoin_addresses). This makes a total of 25 bytes.

With a 111 prefix you have all the numbers between 111*2^(24*8) and 112*2^(24*8)-1. In binary form you have values from

1101111000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 to

1101111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111

which is 111 (in binary 1101111) and all the possible combinations of the hash and checksum values.

If you write the numbers from 111*2^(24*8) to 112*2^(24*8)-1 in base58 encoding (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Base58Check_encoding) you have the range from:

mfWxJ45yp2SFn7UciZyNpvDKrzbhuzkU7H to n4rZHAPGXCu8bYchjzJhK3V7VVredELJRc

All your proposed addresses are below the first possible one.

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