Bitcoin is an _open source_ project and the source code is available under an open (MIT) license, free to download and use for any purpose. Open source means more than simply free to use. It also means that bitcoin is developed by an open community of volunteers. At first, that community consisted of only Satoshi Nakamoto. By 2016, bitcoin's source code has more than 400 contributors with about a dozen developers working on the code almost full time and several dozen more on a part-time basis. Anyone can contribute to the code - including you!
@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ When bitcoin was created by Satoshi Nakamoto, the software was actually complete
Even though Bitcoin Core includes a reference implementation of a wallet, this is not intended to be used as a production wallet for users or for applications. Application developers are advised to build wallets using modern standards such as BIP39 and BIP32 (see <<mnemonic_code_words>> and <<hd_wallets>>).
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== Bitcoin Development Environment
=== Bitcoin Development Environment
If you're a developer, you will want to setup a development environment with all the tools, libraries and support software for writing bitcoin applications. In this highly technical chapter, we'll walk through that process step-by-step. If the material becomes too dense (and you're not actually setting up a development environment) feel free to skip to the next chapter, which is less technical.
Matthew Hacker
7 years ago