Author: Eric Lombrozo 2015-08-18 21:17:41
Published on: 2015-08-18T21:17:41+00:00
The Bitcoin community has been discussing the possibility of a block size limit increase for some time. However, the biggest problem is convincing enough people to switch without causing any damage. While testing on a testnet is possible, it is not ideal for testing certain scenarios that could be difficult to predict. The idea of deploying experimental code onto the "live" bitcoin blockchain was considered unnecessarily risky. Instead, the proposal was made to deploy a block size limit experiment on the public global testnet blockchain to collect data for future hardforks. A proposal was put forward with the aim of showing that reaching consensus for a Bitcoin hardfork is possible. The objectives included demonstrating the feasibility of a successful hardfork, collecting data for future hardforks, and relieving pressure on full blocks without adversely affecting network performance. A backup plan was also proposed, which would activate if no other consensus was reached before February 1, 2016. If the backup plan was adopted, a better solution was expected to be found by December 31, 2017. The proposal suggested increasing the block size to 1.5MB, which is smaller than the current 2MB proposal, but would still provide valuable data. The rationale behind this was that technology has since improved by over 50% since the 1MB cap was set five years ago. The proposal also suggested an 80% miner approval rate to ensure the new fork was secured by enough mining power. If the community agreed with this experimental hardfork, the plan would be announced on bitcoin.org and coding of the patch would begin immediately. If no further consensus could be reached, a new version of Bitcoin Core with the patch would be released before February 1, 2016, and everyone would be asked to upgrade immediately.
Updated on: 2023-06-10T20:19:36.951580+00:00