Published on: 2018-11-17T03:21:40+00:00
In a Lightning-dev email thread, René Pickhardt proposed the implementation of a second routing algorithm to address the issue of slow and failing payments on the lightning network. The proposal involves local payment fragmentation, also known as local AMP, which would allow intermediate nodes to fragment an HTLC (hash time lock contract) and find alternative paths to forward a payment. One suggested strategy is to use friend-of-a-friend information to determine if the original HTLC can be forwarded from Alice to Bob in a fragmented way. This approach could benefit from the autopilot feature, which creates many triangles in the network for friend-of-a-friend nodes to exist.The sender would still be able to select the basic route, and the full route would remain private. Another solution suggested was for two nodes that fail to forward the HTLCs to work collaboratively to find a path between them and return this information as a routing suggestion to the payer. This would allow the payer to try and send an adapted onion package along the suggested path.To further improve payment reliability, ZmnSCPxj suggested using active probing and ping before commitment. Ping before commit reduces the window for stuck payments by pinging the next node before offering an HTLC, allowing the sender to determine if the connection dropped before sending the HTLC.Overall, these proposals aim to improve payment reliability and mitigate slow payments or failures on the lightning network. The local payment fragmentation approach and the collaborative path finding suggestion provide potential solutions to address these issues. Additionally, the use of active probing and ping before commitment could further enhance payment reliability.
Updated on: 2023-07-31T20:48:40.973306+00:00