Introduction Bitcoin is the first digital currency in human history that does not require a central clearing authority. The technological implication of this invention is profound: it opens the possibility of building a completely distributed financial system where no centralized authorities are needed to conduct financial transactions. Some even venture to predict that such a system will eventually lead to the end of central banking and the cease of nation-states. Nowadays, you can easily find many answers to this question on the Web: from blogs to magazine articles, to books, to video lectures.
The actual contents of these answers vary widely: from hand-waving introductions to conceptual accounts of the ideas behind Bitcoin, to painstaking illustrations of the nitty-gritty details of the bits-and-bytes layouts of the Bitcoin protocol. After spending countless hours on reading many of these answers, somehow, I was still unsatisfied. If Bitcoin is a black-box, then the best among all these answers provide a blueprint of this black-box.
A blueprint conceptually documents an engineering design. It is most useful for those who already understand the design, since it summarizes the ideas behind the design and the important inner mechanisms of the system. For novices who have little or no knowledge about the design, though of course helpful, it adds another layer of abstraction and filters out important implementation details, and thus hinders a thorough understanding of the system. This book takes a different approach. Instead of presenting you yet another conceptual account of Bitcoin, I will dissect the Bitcoin source code: I will open the black-box, examine all its parts, and show you how to put them back together to build a complete system.
Code is the ultimate expression of design. It reflects the behavior of a software system as it is, and it reveals the inner-workings of the system in a plain and straightforward way. The Bitcoin source code is the ultimate answer to the question "how Bitcoin works".
Why the Bitcoin Rave?
Indeed, it is the ultimate answer to any question you can ever possibly ask about the Bitcoin system. After Satoshi Nakamoto released the original code and disappeared from the public eye in , the Bitcoin Foundation took over the control of the subsequent developments.
This books covers version v0. It is one of the original versions written by Satoshi and the earliest version available in GitHub. It contains about 16, lines of code after removing all the empty lines , and thus a complete coverage of the whole code base in a book is a manageable task. The later versions developed by the Bitcoin Foundation did not change the original architecture. Understanding this original version will give you a solid foundation for further exploring of the later versions. Indeed, if you compare this version with the later ones, you will find that all the important classes are unchanged, and that many important functions are kept the same name.
Another reason to cover this version is that its coding style is classic: dense and concise. That is how Satoshi managed to implement such a complicated system in just 16, lines of code.
This version keeps all the system states in global variables. Once you get familiar with these variables and understand what they do, which, of course, takes some time and efforts, reading the code becomes a fairly enjoyable endeavor. You will not suffer from the typical code-reading fatigue caused by a programming style in which "everything happens somewhere else" a quote from Adele Goldberg. Everything happens right there in the place where it supposes to happen, cleanly and precisely.
Who should read this book This book is intended for readers who want to acquire a thorough knowledge of Bitcoin. Morning Brief Podcast.
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Abc Large. Transactions happen when heavily encrypted codes are passed across a computer network. Bitcoin has suffered controversies. James days ago. Hi, I''m Mr. James Miller i have been looking for a business partner there in your country for quite sometime now as i have an urgent business proposal kindly contact me if interested at jamesmellar1 gmail.
A Dissection of Bitcoin - Informática I
Kanth King days ago. If TRUMP says bitcoins are illegal all those holding bitcoins investing there life savings, will hang the same night.. Padamnoor Pradeep days ago. Why can''t Indian government generate bitcoins and sell to our neighbouring countries!!! View Comments Add Comments. Payments NFC vs. Aviation Government is in a hurry to sell its airports stakes. Subscribe to ETPrime. Browse Companies:.
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