Author: Pieter Wuille 2013-05-09 01:13:39
Published on: 2013-05-09T01:13:39+00:00
In a discussion between Jeff Garzik and John Dillon, the possibility of Satoshi Nakamoto intentionally designing the Bitcoin protocol to require a hard fork in the year 2038 was brought up. However, Garzik dismissed the idea, stating that 2038 is too far in the future to be relevant. Additionally, he believes that breaking the block header format would invalidate all mining hardware. Furthermore, Garzik argues that there is no need to expand the precision beyond 32 bits, as even 16 bits would suffice assuming that there is never more than an 18-hour gap between two blocks. Finally, Pieter adds that assuming the "full" 64-bit time is the smallest one that makes sense given its lower 32 bits would work perfectly fine.
Updated on: 2023-05-19T16:57:48.639842+00:00