Utreexo and Its Impact on Bitcoin Scalability

I recently came across Utreexo from the MIT Digital Currency Initiative while diving into OP_RETURN talks. It's got potential to address some Bitcoin scalability issues. Some nodes already support it like Floresta, but big names like Core or Knots haven't jumped on it yet.

So Utreexo works kinda like SPV wallets, right? Instead of storing all UTXOs, you got a Merkle root of them. It’s simpler to manage, especially if you're starting from scratch. You can easily add blocks into the mix.

@stwenhao really nailed it with that comparison! SPV is definitely a good way to think about it. But I still feel a bit lost on one thing: if Utreexo proofs become mandatory, wouldn’t that mean a big change in consensus?

I totally agree. Forcing it might lead to a big uproar. People don’t like mandatory changes, and we might see another drama like we had with OP_RETURN. Better to have it as an optional upgrade.

It’s like a giant bit array, right? Each bit tells if a UTXO exists or not. But I feel like there’s a lot more complexity under the hood that we’re not seeing right now.

From what I understand, making UTXO commitment part of the protocol feels huge. That’s not something you can just switch on overnight. All nodes would have to adapt to keep things running smoothly.

Seriously, how would you even spam a Mimblewimble blockchain like Grin? Doesn’t seem possible, right?

I’m curious about the size of transactions that include Utreexo proof versus regular ones. Can’t find the info anywhere. Probably gonna be a long wait till we see any changes.

You can embed some data into private keys, but it’s tricky. If you’re sending a transaction from Alice to Bob, and then Bob to Charlie, it makes it hard to just clean up.

Spammers won’t care about efficiency. If they wanna push data, they’ll pay whatever fees are necessary. It's all about turning chains into something worse.

True, the real challenge is how to order all these bytes from different keys. Recovering info from a pure MW chain is just a pain.

Yo, even Litecoin is on that optional-MW chain, right? So yeah, it’s not just the pure ones.

Exactly, the hybrid approach in Litecoin allows for fake public keys, making spamming possible.

What if miners just ground their private keys to store data? You sacrifice some bytes for better ordering. That could work.

But then we might run into weak signatures. If spammers use N signatures, they could cause chaos. Gotta think about the order of public nonces too.

If the consensus changes, we could end up with a mandatory Utreexo proof without realizing it, especially if classic UTXO nodes fade away.

Isn’t it cleaner to just soft fork with a new transaction format that includes the UTXO proof from the get-go?

Of course, but the status quo is usually to stick with ‘doing nothing’. That’s the default.

Well if it’s in mempools and gets accepted in a block, what else matters? Re-implementing limits will be a headache.

This is why introducing standard rules was simpler back in the day. Now it's a whole different ball game.