From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (smtp1.linux-foundation.org [172.17.192.35]) by mail.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id C6E9B1006 for ; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 05:14:14 +0000 (UTC) X-Greylist: from auto-whitelisted by SQLgrey-1.7.6 Received: from s47.web-hosting.com (s47.web-hosting.com [199.188.200.16]) by smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 21F2CEE for ; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 05:14:14 +0000 (UTC) Received: from localhost ([::1]:32775 helo=server47.web-hosting.com) by server47.web-hosting.com with esmtpa (Exim 4.85) (envelope-from ) id 1aAsnU-001D4f-VZ for bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org; Mon, 21 Dec 2015 00:14:13 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2015 00:14:12 -0500 From: jl2012 To: bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org Message-ID: <537b176b25a681255eee5f6c4268ab6e@xbt.hk> X-Sender: jl2012@xbt.hk User-Agent: Roundcube Webmail/1.0.5 X-AntiAbuse: This header was added to track abuse, please include it with any abuse report X-AntiAbuse: Primary Hostname - server47.web-hosting.com X-AntiAbuse: Original Domain - lists.linuxfoundation.org X-AntiAbuse: Originator/Caller UID/GID - [47 12] / [47 12] X-AntiAbuse: Sender Address Domain - xbt.hk X-Get-Message-Sender-Via: server47.web-hosting.com: authenticated_id: jl2012@xbt.hk X-Source: X-Source-Args: X-Source-Dir: X-From-Rewrite: unmodified, already matched X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.6 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,RCVD_IN_DNSWL_LOW autolearn=ham version=3.3.1 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.3.1 (2010-03-16) on smtp1.linux-foundation.org Subject: [bitcoin-dev] =?utf-8?q?A_new_payment_address_format_for_segregat?= =?utf-8?q?ed_witness_or_not=3F?= X-BeenThere: bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.12 Precedence: list List-Id: Bitcoin Development Discussion List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2015 05:14:14 -0000 On the -dev IRC I asked the same question and people seem don't like it. I would like to further elaborate this topic and would like to consult merchants, exchanges, wallet devs, and users for their preference Background: People will be able to use segregated witness in 2 forms. They either put the witness program directly as the scriptPubKey, or hide the witness program in a P2SH address. They are referred as "native SW" and "SW in P2SH" respectively Examples could be found in the draft BIP: https://github.com/jl2012/bips/blob/segwit/bip-segwit.mediawiki As a tx malleability fix, native SW and SW in P2SH are equally good. The SW in P2SH is better in terms of: 1. It allows payment from any Bitcoin reference client since version 0.6.0. 2. Slightly better privacy by obscuration since people won't know whether it is a traditional P2SH or a SW tx before it is spent. I don't consider this is important since the type of tx will be revealed eventually, and is irrelevant when native SW is more popular The SW in P2SH is worse in terms of: 1. It requires an additional push in scriptSig, which is not prunable in transmission, and is counted as part of the core block size 2. It requires an additional HASH160 operation than native SW 3. It provides 160bit security, while native SW provides 256bit 4. Since it is less efficient, the tx fee is likely to be higher than native SW (but still lower than non-SW tx) --------------------------- The question: should we have a new payment address format for native SW? The native SW address in my mind is basically same as existing P2PKH and P2SH addresses: BASE58(address_version|witness_program|checksum) , where checksum is the first 4 bytes of dSHA256(address_version|witness_program) Why not a better checksum algorithm? Reusing the existing algorithm make the implementation much easier and safe. Pros for native SW address: 1. Many people and services are still using BASE58 address 2. Promote the use of native SW which allows lower fee, instead of the less efficient SW in P2SH 3. Not all wallets and services support payment protocol (BIP70) 4. Easy for wallets to implement 5. Even if a wallet wants to only implement SW in P2SH, they need a new wallet format anyway. So there is not much exta cost to introduce a new address format. 6. Since SW is very flexible, this is very likely to be the last address format to define. Cons for native SW address: 1. Addresses are bad and should not be used anymore (some arguments could be found in BIP13) 2. Payment protocol is better 3. With SW in P2SH, it is not necessary to have a new address format 4. Depends on the length of the witness program, the address length could be a double of the existing address 5. Old wallets won't be able to pay to a new address (but no money could be lost this way) ------------------------------ So I'd like to suggest 2 proposals: Proposal 1: To define a native SW address format, while people can still use payment protocol or SW in P2SH if the want Proposal 2: No new address format is defined. If people want to pay as lowest fee as possible, they must use payment protocol. Otherwise, they may use SW in P2SH Since this topic is more relevant to user experience, in addition to core devs, I would also like to consult merchants, exchanges, wallet devs, and users for their preferences.