Published on: 2018-12-05T14:08:56+00:00
In this context, the author discusses various aspects related to difficulty adjustments in blockchain technology. They propose allowing the difficulty in solving a block to linearly drop as the solvetime exceeds a certain limit, which would be compatible with past delays. This idea could be beneficial for smaller coins that struggle with persistent hash rate changes causing long delays. The author suggests using a daily-rolling average difficulty adjustment, similar to Bitcoin Cash (BCH), as a potential solution. They also mention an interesting research concept called "intra-block" timestamp-based difficulty adjustment, which tightens the Poisson distribution and increases availability at the expense of consistency. However, this approach requires a tight future time limit to prevent timestamp manipulation.The author highlights that currently, three coins have implemented and tested this timestamp-based difficulty adjustment on their testnets. Although the idea may not be necessary for Bitcoin, it is being researched and implemented for other cryptocurrencies. Moving forward, the author raises questions about the time it would take to make changes in block confirmation times and whether a hardfork would be necessary if confirmation times averaged hours or days. They suggest that enough economic interests might align to amass computing power to prioritize important bitcoin transactions, while other cryptocurrencies and technologies like the Lightning Network fill in the gaps. Alternatively, a group could fork the code to adjust the difficulty more rapidly, creating a value for a "Faster-Difficulty-Adjustment" (FDA) version of bitcoin. The author believes that peaceful forking can be learned from previous experiences with Bitcoin Cash and other splits. Lastly, the author emphasizes the importance of gaining insight into how core developers will respond to increasing demands for faster difficulty adjustments.Overall, the author presents ideas and potential solutions for addressing persistent hash rate changes and long delays in smaller coins, while also contemplating the implications and possibilities for Bitcoin's block confirmation times.
Updated on: 2023-08-02T00:16:58.473091+00:00