FAQs — Most Frequently Asked Questions in IOST Official International Telegram Group

This FAQ article is an updated version based on the one that the former IOST telegram administrator, Chris, published. I have also been active for a while in the Telegram group, and now, I will continue his work and update the post he left for us. Here, I would like to express my gratitude to Chris for making our lives easier.

Note from Chris: “I’ve been active in the Telegram group for some time now, daily answering questions. To make helping a little easier I’ve created this FAQ. It’s a bit filled with personal opinions but should help out a lot. In the future, more tools, (hardware) wallets, and blockchain explorers will be available, thus this post can become outdated.”

Content:

1. How can I create a mainnet account?
2. What desktop / mobile wallets can I use?
3. What about iGAS and iRAM?
4. Can I stake IOST?
5. How can I vote IOST?
6. How do I research a node?
7. What are the rewards?
8. How can I run a node?
9. Help! My wallet doesn’t work, and nothing happens when I do a (trans)action.
10. How can I swap my ERC-20 tokens to mainnet tokens?
11. Why does IOST do the token swap only at exchanges? Can we do a manual swap?
12. When will the mainnet token swap end?

For support, please visit the IOST Official Telegram:

• https://t.me/officialios
• https://t.me/iost_announcements

1. How can I create a mainnet account?

From time to time, you can find that there are platforms that allow you to create a mainnet account for free. Still, although you get a free mainnet account, those are not actually free. There is always someone who pays for you, so please show your gratitude to the payer, and please do appreciate the gift this person gave you today :).

You can buy a mainnet account at https://iostaccount.io for 150 IOST. Alternatively, you can use TokenPocket to buy an activation code through PayPal, Alipay, or WeChat pay for $1 or choose “create by a friend” and ask a friend who is already on IOST to pay it for you or do it via exchanges.

Some IOST nodes might also be giving away free TokenPocket activations through Telegram. Please link with them on IOST official International community group.

For a detailed tutorial, please check our new user guide

New User Guide: How to Register an IOST Mainnet Account

Notes:

• Free account creation services availability is subject to the providers’ funds pool. All IOST accounts have a cost, so when you get one for free, it means someone else is paying on your behalf. If you can’t find any free account provider and need one urgently, consider paying for one.
• The name you choose when creating an account is also your wallet address.
• Make sure to backup your private key safely!! When lost, you won’t be able to access your funds anymore, and nobody can help you retrieve them!!
• If you don’t feel comfortable creating a mainnet account through a third-party site/app, rest assure you can change the private key(s). You could use the Windows CLI wallet (linked at point 2) to generate a new private key offline, as advised in the tutorial. Be careful when changing your private key(s). If anything goes wrong, nobody can help you access your funds.

2. What desktop/mobile wallets can I use?

At the moment, your best options to access your mainnet account (although others are available) are.

• iWallet open source chrome extension or Jetstream Chrome extension
• TokenPocket (IOST partner), COBO, Huobi, etc. for mobile

Just paste your private key(s) into them, and you are ready to go.

For more information, please visit:

wallet_en - IOST

For crypto veterans, there is also a Windows CLI wallet available.

iWallet - The Native IOST Wallet for Windows Users by IOST Watch

Notes:

I hear a lot of people saying things like: “I’ve got my IOST in iWallet.” To avoid misconceptions, please understand that you don’t hold your tokens in any software wallet. iWallet, TokenPocket, or any other wallets are just a means to access your IOST account. You could even use iWallet to vote, delete iWallet, and use TokenPocket with the same private key to claim rewards or unvote. Again: You don’t store your tokens in a wallet, but you access your IOST account with it. This way, TokenPocket, iWallet, IOSTABC, and blockchain explorers/wallets are redundant and replaceable.

There is a reason the dev team didn’t create an official IOST wallet. It disincentivizes any other wallet developers because they think the official wallet will get all the support, promotion, etc., so developers wouldn’t be interested in creating these tools for IOST. Also, 3rd party wallets are pretty essential from a decentralization perspective. If IOST core is controlling protocol and wallet, it’s not ideal.

3. What about iGAS and iRAM?

Please consult the following article.

What are iGAS and iRAM? | Learn How You Can Utilize The IOST Network

TLDR iGas:

• iGAS is what you burn when doing (trans)actions.
• iGAS regenerates daily, so (trans)actions are actually free.
• Although doing a lot of actions can burn up your iGAS, to get a bigger fuel tank, you can pledge IOST for iGAS.
• When you run out of iGAS, maybe pledge 10 IOST to it and see how that goes. You can always pledge more if needed.
• When ‘done,’ you can unpledge the IOST, and after a lockdown of 3 days, those IOST are returned to your balance and are yours to use again.
• You won’t make gains or get rewards for pledging IOST on iGAS.

TLDR iRAM:

• iRAM is the memory to store information of your personal mainnet account. A mainnet account needs 1KB to be able to exist, and this is the amount you start at.
• You’ll need to buy more iRAM when you need to store more information / smart contracts. For example, when you want to vote for more than 3 nodes, you’ll need to buy 1kb extra.
• When you buy or sell iRAM, 2% of the IOST you pay is burned (deflationary model), so you can sell iRAM back to yourself, but you’ll get less IOST in return.
• You won’t make gains or get rewards for juggling iRAM. Just buy as little iRAM as needed.

4. Can I “stake” IOST?

Yes. Please read sections 1 and 3 in this article.

IOST Voter’s Guide 101 | All You Need to Know about IOST Voting (Staking)

TLDR:

• We call staking ‘voting.’ You vote for a node you favor and lock your IOST on them. By doing so, you support that node / the IOST ecosystem, and you’ll get rewarded some IOST.
• By voting from a personal mainnet account, you won’t lose possession of your IOST tokens, and they are still locked under your private key. You can even unvote when the node goes offline.
• If you unvote, after a lockdown of 3 days, those IOST are returned to your balance and yours to use again. Just make sure to keep this in mind when you want to sell at a certain price point.

5. How can I vote IOST?

Please refer to point 4.

6. How do I research a node?

I recommend doing research and vote for a node you can actually contact on Telegram or through social media such as Twitter, Line, KakaoTalk, Weibo, WeChat, etc. On https://iostabc.com/producers/, you’ll find a list of nodes and details such as their websites. As part of decentralization, the node owner has to input a command https://medium.com/iost/node-partners-rewards-claim-guide-8abd70f0c6e4 (daily) to release your rewards. To see how often a node gives rewards, check nodes' wallet address transactions see how often they execute candidateWithdraw command. This is also shown under the DIVIDEND RECORDS tab. Even when the node owner skips a day or two, your rewards will accumulate in the background.

7. What are the rewards?

Please refer to section 2 in the following article.

IOST Voter’s Guide 101 | All You Need to Know about IOST Voting (Staking)

8. How can I run a node?

There is a differentiation between Servi and Partner nodes, and you can apply for both. Read this article about minimum specs and applications here.

Become Servi Node · IOST Docs

To streamline the on-boarding of Servi Nodes, enable the stability and progressive scaling of the IOST network, and ensure the profitability of Servi Nodes from block production rewards, the required vote amount received from Voters, and/or from self-staking has been increased to 10,000,000 Votes.

Servi Node Guide: Requirements and On-boarding

9. Help! My wallet doesn’t work, and nothing happens when I do a (trans)action.

This happens when you don’t have enough iGAS or iRAM; check if you got enough (see point 3).

If trying to stake/buy iRAM/iGAS with iWallet gives error undefined(status code: undefined}) then use https://www.iostabc.com/wallet/resources to succeed.

If you get a -time out- error, make sure your time and region settings are right, maybe reboot or just press F5. When on mobile, set time to auto instead of manual.

10. How can I swap my ERC-20 tokens to mainnet tokens?

Currently, all swaps from ERC-20 IOST tokens to Mainnet Tokens are done through exchanges. You can deposit your ERC-20 IOST tokens to exchanges that support the IOST Mainnet Token Swap.

To keep it short, I’ll just talk about swapping through Binance for now. Please contact your favorite exchange and consult them directly if they will swap the ERC20 tokens for you.

Binance Will Support The IOST Mainnet Token Swap

Quote: “Please note that even after the IOST mainnet is online, if you choose to deposit ERC20 IOST tokens into your Binance account, we will continue to process the token swap for you.”

So just send the ERC-20 IOST to your main ETH account on Binance. Binance will swap them for you. In about 20 minutes, they will appear as IOST mainnet tokens on your balance.

11. Why does IOST do the token swap only at exchanges? Can we do a manual swap?

Token Swap is still an abstract concept for many non-technical users. Manual swapping is not only complicated but also risky. IOST has not yet officially launched a manual token swap scheme. Please avoid trying it or any company claiming to provide such a service outside of the above-mentioned exchanges. IOST’s selected exchange partners are world-renowned, high-security global exchanges where users can use safely without any concerns.

12. When will the mainnet token swap end?

IOST has already started the Mainnet Token Swap, and it will be continued throughout 2021 for users to complete the swap from IOST ERC-20 Token to IOST Mainnet Token. IOST has set an adequate time frame for this token swap to ensure that every user can complete the token swap during this transition period. IOST Foundation will send advance notice to communities on various platforms before it ends the token swap.

If you would like to hang out with the IOST community, check out the following official channels:

• International English Telegram Group: https://t.me/officialios
• IOST Announcement Channel: https://t.me/iost_announcements
• IOST Official Twitter: https://twitter.com/IOStoken
• IOST CTO Terry Wang Twitter: https://twitter.com/terrence_iost
• IOST CEO Jimmy Zhong Twitter: https://twitter.com/jimmyzhong_iost
• Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/IOStoken
• Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/IOSTofficial
• Facebook Group: http://bit.ly/IOST-FB-Group

…………………………………………………………………….