Author: laurentmt 2016-04-15 12:20:31
Published on: 2016-04-15T12:20:31+00:00
Laurent, a Lightning Network noob, asks Rusty about routing payments via beacons and whether all payments have to go through the selected beacon nodes. Rusty explains that while some protocols like the pulse protocol are based on beacons to update routing tables, they don't require that all messages go through the beacons, rather messages are routed through the first common ancestor of source and target in the spanning tree associated with the selected beacon. The drawback with this approach is that the source doesn't know the route beforehand, but it puts less pressure on the beacons. Laurent also inquires about an update strategy for the routing tables, noting that two variables determine the best route: channel capacity at time t, which determines if a route can be used to transfer the amount, and fees charged by nodes. Capacity is more dynamic of the two variables, and Laurent wonders if it's information stored in the routing tables or checked in live when payment is propagated. Rusty replies that there are several ways to do routing via a known set of landmarks, and since each node is interested in the cheapest route to and from each beacon, it's easy to propagate the best route known, although some heuristics will be required since cheapest depends on the amount.
Updated on: 2023-05-23T23:25:57.769106+00:00