Start time for BIP141 (segwit)

Summary:

The implementation of SegWit has been a contentious issue for some time, with objections being raised to the way it has been implemented. Despite this, most underlying libraries have already been adapted or are in the process of being adapted for SegWit. However, since SegWit is not yet live on mainnet, most libraries cannot release their SegWit supported versions until SegWit is released as final in 0.13.1. Additionally, companies are already planning to update their services for SegWit. The adoption chart may not reflect the actual state of affairs as some companies may have updated firmware versions that have not yet been released. BIP9 is designed to coordinate miner upgrade and activation. The starttime delay is intended to prevent unreleased software from setting the version bit prematurely. Non-mining full nodes are under no constraints to upgrade on a specific schedule, which is by design of soft forks. Signalling will not begin until the first diff retarget period after the starttime of November 15th. Practically speaking, there will be a minimum of 4-6 weeks at the very least before activation can happen. Wallets have had almost a year to tinker with SegWit and make sure they are not so poorly written that they will flame out when SegWit is implemented. However, some wallets are taking a "wait and see" approach due to objections to the way that SegWit has been implemented. The vast majority of wallets are not ready for SegWit, but it is difficult to reflect the actual state of affairs. Wallets may not want to invest resources adding support for a feature that will never be activated, and we won't know if SegWit will be activated or not until it is actually locked in. Even if all wallets do support it, they need to be rolled out and people need to download those updates, which takes time. A minimum of two months after the lock-in of SegWit would be a safe time for people to actually upgrade.

Updated on: 2023-06-11T20:25:15.833777+00:00