Quote from: mcgullen on June 02, 2014, 09:36:59 PM

Hi All,

I have a stupid question: I don't understand how one bitcoin can be divided into satoshis.

Based on my basic understanding of how bitcoin works, it seems like each bitcoin is associated with an address (a hash of someone's public key?) in the public ledgor (the block chain?). If this association happens at the coin level, how can a bitcoin be divided into satoshis that can be associated with different addresses?

The whitepaper suggests it has to do with "script," "inputs" and "outputs." But my brain explodes when I read this on the Bitcoin wiki:

Quote

Bitcoin uses a scripting system for transactions. Forth-like, Script is simple, stack-based, and processed from left to right. It is purposefully not Turing-complete, with no loops.

WTF?!

Can someone please point me to resources on bitcoin divisibility that are more easily understandable? Thanks!

Each bitcoin isn't associated with an address per se....don't think of it that way...
(and Forget about the scripting system for now)

Just think of it as inputs and outputs. Your inputs and outputs are in decimal form up to
8 decimals in precision, so they never really need to get divided into satoshis. They sort of already are.
You can initiate a transaction of say 4.3164 BTC and that's the output. Pretty much end of story unless
That wasn't the full unspent output (balance) in the address and you want to send that back to yourself.

Here is an interesting thread when it comes to breaking down the code:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=41718.0