Segwit Reading Assignment

Blockchain and Bitcoin 101
#122

  1. Increase the block size.

  2. Transaction malleability, along with supporting a second layer.

  3. Segwit made Lightning possible.

  4. No (soft fork)

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#123
  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?

Because 1 MB blocks were full, the alternative was to increase the block size.

  1. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?

It solved also the malleability issue. Because the signature was included in the transaction, changing it was causing the hash used as transaction id to change. Getting rid of the signature from the hashed data means that if the signature change, the hash remains the same and it’s not possible anymore to do such a scammy attack (to tell a sender that the transaction doesn’t exist, while in reality it still exists, just with a different signature modified by the attacker).

  1. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?

SegWit made it possible to develop second layer protocols. Lightning network is a second layer protocol.

  1. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?

Because it was a soft fork, nobody was forced to do anything. Howerver, big part of the community updated and many wallets support segwit.

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#124

1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?
larger block size that could handle more transactions

2. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?
Segwit increased the security by eliminating the ability of malleability which would allow for stolen coins

3. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?
Segwit allows for the implementation of the lightning network

4. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?
It seems people are not forced to use segwit however there are advantages that are coming and more and more people are changing to adapt to the tech.

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#125

  1. 2mb blocks instead of 1mb blocks.

  2. Transaction Malleability Bug

  3. The lightning network is a second layer solution. The Transaction Malleability Bug needed to be fixed before such second layer sollutions can work fine. (security)

  4. No they aren’t but the advantages to use it are too big/high, so actually they are :stuck_out_tongue:

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#126

block weight
separating the witness data
second layer
only if wallet is upgraded

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#127

  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?
    One proposed alternative was to increase the maximum size of one block to more than the 1MB.

  2. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?
    It fixed transaction malleability by removing the signature information (“witness” information) and storing it outside the base transaction block.

  3. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?
    Segwit supports the development of second layer protocols. The malleability fix made any feature that relied on unconfirmed txs less risky and easier to design.

  4. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?
    No, it is a soft fork, so it still falls within the rules before the update.

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#128
  1. Proposed alternative to Segwit is Block size increase.
  2. To fix malleability issue to make it more secure.
  3. Making second layer possible.
  4. No
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#129

  1. The alternative to Segwit was Bitcoin Cash and the option they chose was to increase the blocksize.

  2. Segwit solved the scaling issue in conjunction with a mallaebility issue involving people to change the witness or signature information resulting in new transactions id’s. By removing the signatures from the block even if they are altered the block and transaction id remain the same.

  3. The segwit and lighting network are connected because of bitcoin/litecoin. Without the development of segwit the lighting network would not be possible. It would have been far to risky to implement as a second layer on the mainnet with people changing sigscript and scamming people.

  4. No people wallets and other services are not required to use segwit, while it provides cheaper fees some people exchanges and wallets have not upgraded and continue to use it.

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#130
  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?

Bitcoin cash. Bigger block size. Hard fork needed.

  1. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?

The maleability issue. Changing the Tx ID by changing the signature that was a part of the tx hash.

  1. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected

Lightning network was enabled due to Segwit.

  1. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?

No.

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#131
  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?

A fork enabling larger block size, which created bitcoin cash

  1. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?

Fixed the transaction malleability security problem.

  1. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?

SEGWIT enabled the development and implementation of Lightning network which is an off chain peer to peer protocol where transactions are signed off chain.

“The malleability fix made any feature that relied on unconfirmed transactions less risky and easier to design.”

"The lightning network will further boost bitcoin’s transaction capacity by taking frequent, small transactions off-chain, only settling on the bitcoin blockchain when the users are ready.’

  1. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?

No, and adoption has not been universal and has been slow.

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#132
  1. Increase block size
  2. Increase security because it seperated signatures from transactions meaning the receiver could not alter the sender’s signature.
  3. Supports second layer solution which is lightning network
  4. No its compatible with the previous protocol
#133
  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?
    Increase block size
  2. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?
    SegWit fix the problem of malleability and build support for lightning network, schorr signature and etc
  3. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?
    SegWit supports lightning network
  4. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?
    No, SegWit is a protocol upgrade (soft fork) that makes network better and no one forced to use it
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#134
  1. The proposed alternative to Segwit was an increase of the block size.
  2. Segwit solved the malleability issue at the same time.
  3. Segwit supports the development of second layer protocols, such as Lightning. Segwit was activated on the Lightning network in May 2017, before bitcoin.
  4. No one is forced to use Segwit. It is a soft fork.
#135

Question 1

What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?

Another proposed alternative to Segwit was to increase the block size to 2mb. This was a good solution but only in the short term as bitcoin transactions sizes were increasing exponentially. It also came with some other scaleability issues which included the following,

  • Longer transaction times
  • Larger transaction fees
  • More time needed to propagate transactions between nodes
  • More memory was needed
  • More storage was required
  • Would lead to a hard fork

Question 2

What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?

Apart from the scaling issue Segwit solved the Transaction Malliability problem and by moving the transaction signature outside the transaction it was now not possible to exploit the transaction Id by altering the signature. Segwit also allowed for the introduction of more transactions per block because without the signature information in the transaction it left more room for transactions… It also coined a new term called **block weight"". there is now a 4MB cap on data but the transaction block size is still limited to 1MB. Segwit also allowed for layer 2 solutions to be incorporated into the blockchain as the maliability issue prevented this till this point.

Question 3

How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?

Because of the Segwit fix it allowed the the lightening network to develop applications which use features that depend on unconfirmed transactions less risky and easier to design. Lightening will also help with the speed of the bitcoin network by taking small regular transactions off chain.

Question 4

Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?

Segwit was a soft fork so it is totally backward compatible with older versions so in short no service or people were forced to change to use the Segwit upgrade. There was one group of people that weren’t happy because they believed that Segwit was only a temporary solution and that they were only delaying the problem even further but perhaps with new feature coming online those voices may be quiet in the future.

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#136
  1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?
    Enhance the blocksize of a bitcoin block
  2. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?
    Transaction malleability, which was used to change the transaction id by only editing the signature and not the content of the transaction. With Segwit the signature is not part of the transaction information anymore.
  3. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?
    Due to the transaction malleability fix through segwit, second layer solution can also handle the smaller transaction information faster
  4. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?
    There is no force using segwit.
#137
  1. Increasing the block size.
  2. Segwit removed possibility of malleability/altering sigs, and reduced TX cost.
  3. Segwit allows second layer solutions to be built, lightning network is one of these solutions.
  4. No one is forced to use Segwit. A lot of large providers already do.
#138

What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?
Increasing the block size limit from 1mb
What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?
By removing the transaction signature from the blocks it also removed the risk of someone manipulating the signature.
How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?
Segwit reduced the risk and made it easier to design second-layer protocols and smart contracts on the network
Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?
No, Segwit is a softfork

#139

The alternative to segwit is to increase the block size.

Segwit solved the transaction malleability issue.

Segwit and lightning are connected through a segwit supporting an extra layer protocol that the lightning network can be developed on.

No, older wallets are not forced to use segwit. Eventually more will adopt it. It was a soft fork.

#140

Reading Assignment: Segwit

1. What was a proposed alternative to Segwit?

A proposed alternative was to simply increase the block limit (bitcoin cash) to allow for more transactions in each block.

2. What did Segwit solve more than just the scaling issue?

Segwit also solved the issue of transaction malleability, since signatures are able to be altered after confirmation they would also alter the transaction ID, making it appear as though the transaction never took place (even though it did). With segwit, altering the signature does not change the transaction ID since the signature is no longer part of the transaction data.

3. How is Segwit and the Lightning network connected?

Segwit made all second-layer protocols like lighting network easier and safer to implement.

4. Are people, wallets and other services forced to use Segwit?

Since Segwit was added through a soft fork, services could still implement the old protocol and continue to work on the same chain. However, miners using the old protocol will not be able to mine new segwit blocks.

#141

1 A bigger block
2 It solved the malleability problem with the signature.
3 Made second layer solutions with their protocols possible.
4 No, you can still use the old system. legacy If they were forced to then that would have been a hard fork.