Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

no change to miners, they just getwork and hash like normal...

Right. miners stay the same. Its completely transparent to them. they won't even recognize that they mine on two blockchains if you don't tell them.

Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

lots of changes to pools, new patched bitcoind and namecoind, etc...

Right. I have tested it on testnet with an uncomplete interface of my namecoin pool and start to build an alpha version of my pool in order to let interested people try it (on testnet) in order to make sure there are no unknown issues with some or specific miners. Alphaversion will be ready in the next week.

bitcoind need to be patched in order to have support for auxiliary (in our case namecoin) blockchain.

namecoind will undergo some major changes on block (proposed) 24000 in order to be able to act as auxiliary blockchain.

Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

pool sends out getworks that are 'compatible' between both chains

In fact there is a proxy (merged-mine-proxy) who connects to the bitcoind and namecoind. You can connect your miners to this proxy or let for example pushpoold connect to it.

Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

if a miner sends a proof-of-work that is of at least Namecoin difficulty, the pool gets a Namecoin block

Right. It is added to your namecoinds blockchain

Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

if a miner sends a proof-of-work that is of at least Bitcoin difficulty, the pool gets a Namecoin block and a Bitcoin block

No it'll get only a bitcoin block.

With a reasonable low probability it might however be possible that a solution fits both blockchains.

Quote from: zamgo on July 16, 2011, 09:38:59 AM

(assuming that Namecoin difficulty is below Bitcoin difficulty. Parity here we come....)

Not nessecarily. Merged mining is of course optional. Each pool operator can decide if he only mines bitcoin, namecoin or do merged mining. However i guess that most users might switch to merged pool as soon as they are available. Thus in a way there will be parity if merged mining is successful.

One thing that wasn't mentioned before (or I missed it) is that this is not only a bitcoin/namecoin thingy. It is possible to have several auxiliary blockchains (however ATM there are no others I know about). Thus if there are more bitcoinlike implementations they all might have a good start (or better start) as long as pool operators start to add them to their pools.