- Describe topological order to help readers understand how that solves
the double spend problem
- Mention that transactions can be safely relayed one block before their
locktime allows them to be included in a block because they'll be
valid next block.
- Be a bit clearer about when subsidy becomes zero due to rounding and
when BIP42 makes it zero unconditionally.
- Describe the creation of the witness merkle root before the block
header merkle root
- Move up note about the retarget off-by-one bug
- Make "best blockchain" an inherent property and not an alias for a
current chain. When a new block arrives that triggers a reorg, we
don't switch best blockchains---the new chain is the best blockchain
and we switch to using it.
- Combine two sections about forks that were repetitive
- Mention that pool miners also need to prove they paid the pool's
preferred coinbase transaction template
- Add a todo to clarify terminology around the 51% attack. The existing
text used this in a way that's consistent with how it was used in
early Bitcoin history, but it's potentially confusing because it
doesn't actually require a majority of hashrate to make the attack and
it confuses it with a censorship attack that does require a majority
(or at least a selfishing mining minority) to maintain.
- Reduce the situations we describe as "double spends". Consensus
prevents double spending within a valid chain; the other situations
are about unconfirmed transactions, which might better be described
using other terms that won't confuse readers into thinking Bitcoin's
double spend protection doesn't work.
- Add warning about backing up more than your seed when multisig or
complex contracts are in use.
- Add a todo to fix "millibits" situation, which might involve image
changes.
- Note that the first commitment transaction (the refund) needs to be
signed before the funding transaction in LN channels.
- Pluralize "bitcoin" as necessary (somehow missed this before).
- Drop mention of tumblebit and teechan, which nobody is working on
AFAIK.
Previously, the text went into a lot of detail about block 277,315,
which was a long time ago. We generalize the text to make it
perpetually current (barring a hard fork).
The previous list mixed consensus rules that transaction must follow
with standard transaction policy, which I think was confusng for readers
and also a problem in a later reference where we claim that all
transactions in a block must follow the rules (true for consensus; false
for policy).
This short subsection described segwit's use of always-true
scriptPubKeys as special. It didn't mention the similar mechanism used
for BIP16 P2SH. It also doesn't mention block-focused changes like
BIP32 and BIP34, or non-script changes like BIP66, BIP68, and BIP113.
I think it should either be greatly expanded or removed, and removing is
easier right now. :-)
"Smore" sounds like "Schnorr", which could be confusing. Also, we
have upgraded signatures now without a soft fork, so the example is
confusing. Although we could add another coin with a soft fork (sort
of), it seems a lot less likely to me, so I think it's a better cadidate
for this section.
- When appropriate, use the current preferred technical term
"reorganize" to describe what a node does when the block at the tip of
the chain is removed.
- Otherwise, just use "converge".
- Orphan blocks are no longer a thing in Bitcoin Core since
headers-first download was implemented (version 0.10). Your peers
know what blocks you have; if they send you any block that doesn't
connect to one of those blocks, you just drop the connection to them.
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.
