Author: ZmnSCPxj 2017-12-13 13:15:46
Published on: 2017-12-13T13:15:46+00:00
The Lightning Network protocol allows nodes to be behind Tor hidden services, which automatically have NAT punching and firewall traversal as long as the firewall allows the Tor protocol to go through. It is unclear if there are already Lightning Network software that supports being run as a Tor hidden service yet. There are no UIs to discover nodes currently running on the network, but current Lightning Network programs keep track of this in their databases, although each one varies in detail. The network bootstrap involves some Lightning Network nodes being discoverable via DNS, then your node will connect to them, request node gossip, then it (if you use some kind of auto-pilot channeling system like what lnd has) will select from the node information it acquires to select some nodes to connect and channel to. There is no UI where someone can accept or reject incoming channel requests. You auto-accept incoming channel requests, but might choose to reject some nodes via any heuristic you choose. Each node indicates as part of its information a "fixed fee" and a "proportional fee". The "fixed fee" is imposed per successful routing attempt, while the "proportional fee" is a ratio of the value traveling through the node when it is on the route. It is expected that there will be many nodes through which people can route, so there will be much competition and eventually the system will settle to a state where most nodes charge the same low fee. There is no performance/reputation info available for any hub, but your auto-channeling program will gather statistics and other information to make some guesses on which nodes have good performance.It should be noted that there is nothing that specially privileges hubs, and any node can become a hub without permission or special treatment of the network, if by "hub" we mean "node with high number of channels". Even the DNS bootstrap should only be used to gather initial node gossip to acquire some other nodes that can potentially be channeled to.
Updated on: 2023-05-24T16:30:50.979667+00:00