- Describe BIP152 compact block relay
- Describe why we still need relay networks (what they do that BIP152
can't)
- Drop FALCON relay (never used, AFAIK)
- Minor updates to relay section
- Remove images: these are incorrect and (IMO) not very useful. The
first image is a legend. The second image contains multiple errors or
confusions, such as implying that a miner needs a full copy of the
block chain or that a wallet is a routing node. The third image is a
very busy depiction of a network showing that clients connect to
nodes, which I think is fine to just say in the text.
- Revise text to not reference images.
- Maintain distinction between nodes and peers by not using terms "full
node client" or "SPV node"
- Update the count of reachable nodes
- Remove some dead full node implementations
- We revise sentence about equality among peers to make it clear that
the peers are full nodes. Clients are not peers of a full node.
- Remove clause about "reciprocity" being the incentive for
participation. I think there are varied reasons for operating a full
node, ranging from wanting to validate your own transactions
(requiring only a pruning full node) to wanting to keep mining
decentralized (e.g. by relaying transactions).
- Drop line about non-Bitcoin-P2P protocols being "extended Bitcoin
network". I think that's an unnecessary categorization.
The commit ab5ae32bae is the last commit
for the second edition, so all changes since then are dropped except for
several commits for the third edition authored by Andreas Antonopoulos.
No attempt is made to remove CC-BY-SA or other licensed content present
in the already-published first or second editions.
This revert may itself be reverted for versions of the book published
under CC-BY-SA.
When came across this paragraph I assumed, thinking "some [other than Bitcoin Core] implementations of the bitcoin client" that Bitcoin Core does not store its UTXO pool anywhere. I did [some research] (https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/102267/where-in-bitcoin-are-mempool-and-utxo-pools-written) and it turns out that it does. Providing
such a detail to the readers would help avoid unnecessary confusion.
