HaCKBee Digest: Weak Block Proof-of-Concept, Bitcoin-based SSI, LND's Pathfinding Deep Dive, and More

May 02, 2024

Highlights

Exploring Weak Block Proof-of-Concept Implementation
Bitcoin-based Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) introduced by LNP/BP Standard Association
All Things Git on Nostr
Block's 3nm Chips Progress in Full Tapeout Process
Understanding LND's Pathfinding Mechanism

Crypto Insights

This SSI leverages Bitcoin's single-use seals and will be used for signing all standard RGB interfaces and libraries'. Asset issuers can also perform the same operation on their contracts, protecting wallets and users from impersonation risks.
The inventor and developer of this SSI is Dr. Orlovsky, the author of the RGB protocol.

A weak block is a block that cannot become the next block on-chain due to insufficient Proof-of-Work (PoW), but it still has a valid structure and transactions.
Greg Sanders released an article Second Look at Weak Blocks, focusing on using weak blocks to improve compact block relay, especially in cases where different policies exist for transaction relay and mining.

The soft fork upgrade proposal OP_CAT was originally introduced as early as October 2023 by Ethan Heilman but remained unnumbered due to the lack of attention from BIP administrator Luke Dashjr.
Ava Chow, a Bitcoin core developer, expressed dissatisfaction and proposed adding BIP editors. Eventually, with the addition of 5 new editors, many delayed BIPs were able to continue processing, and OP_CAT finally received the designation BIP-347.
OP_CAT had previously been given several designations such as 1525, BIN-2024-0001, and BIP-420 due to community dissatisfaction with the original numbering process (Anthony Towns, BIP process friction), resulting in the creation of new systems or proposals.
Additionally, two other opcode proposals OP_TXHASH and OP_CHECKTXHASHVERIFY were also formally assigned, becoming BIP-346.

BitVMX aims to create a secure, extensible, open-source, peer-reviewed, and sidechain-agnostic framework that can be used to develop Bitcoin bridges, aggregator oracles, and SNARK/STARK verifiers.
As part of the project, the research team intends to run a fully compliant RISC-V processor on Bitcoin, programmable using a standard compilation toolchain.

DanConwayDev sees that GitHub has a history of banning accounts and repositories without warning, expressing concerns that this creates a risk of disruption for important projects like Bitcoin-core.
Inspired by Patch-over-Email model, he created gitworkshop.dev based on NIP34 protocol. Through sending git patches over nostr, to enable code collaboration over nostr.

In the foreseeable future, Bitcoin programmability will enter an accelerated phase.
The UTXO Stack in the CKB ecosystem will provide developers newly entering the Bitcoin space with the ability to build protocols using modular stacks.
CKB is also exploring the integration of the Lightning Network with the UTXO Stack, leveraging Bitcoin's native programmability to achieve interoperability between new protocols.

Block, the digital payment company co-founded by Jack Dorsey, has completed the development of 3nm Bitcoin mining chips and is now in the process of completing a full tapeout of the design with a leading global semiconductor foundry. This level of chip has long been a bottleneck in the competition among chip manufacturing companies, with the market previously dominated by Bitmain.
With the introduction of this standalone mining chip, Block will also launch a full bitcoin mining system, involving software development, system engineering capabilities, supply chain experience, and aftermarket support capability, and will deliver tens of millions of devices.

“If you have proprietary brand and distribution why are you going to let ETH, OP, SOL make money off your success? You're going to vertically integrate and start rolling more of your own infra The simplest way to do this is to roll your own L1 or L2 and so teams start here.”