Author: Gregory Maxwell 2012-01-31 02:57:31
Published on: 2012-01-31T02:57:31+00:00
In a message thread, Gavin Andresen suggested removing the IRC bootstrapping mechanism. The removal would reduce code and reports of ISPs tagging Bitcoin as malware. The author raised two concerns: first, having more mechanisms than DNS and hardcoded seed nodes is important to discourage blocking; second, announcing new nodes is inadequate without IRC. Although addr.txt provides an alternative, it may not fully address the issue. However, removing IRC altogether might not be ideal for addressing these issues. The author volunteered to maintain a multi-channel joining node for the foreseeable future to prevent old clients from getting partitioned. Additionally, the author proposed fixing the weaknesses in the IRC protocol. Currently, the IRC protocol has some deficiencies that can cause peer partitioning. For instance, the /who command only returns a few nodes, and we only learn about nodes when they join. The updated irc.cpp file runs for only a half-hour, uses a random nick if it's sure it's not listening, and reconnects if it requires more connections. It also joins two channels at random rather than one. The author emphasized the importance of fixing IRC if it remains a backup mechanism. If not, then it should be removed altogether. Furthermore, removing IRC by default would be a good move due to botnet allegations.
Updated on: 2023-05-18T22:59:21.985789+00:00