From: Mark Friedenbach <mark@friedenbach•org>
To: Bitcoin Protocol Discussion <bitcoin-dev@lists•linuxfoundation.org>
Subject: [bitcoin-dev] Merkle branch verification & tail-call semantics for generalized MAST
Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2017 17:38:55 -0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <5B6756D0-6BEF-4A01-BDB8-52C646916E29@friedenbach.org> (raw)
I would like to propose two new script features to be added to the
bitcoin protocol by means of soft-fork activation. These features are
a new opcode, MERKLE-BRANCH-VERIFY (MBV) and tail-call execution
semantics.
In brief summary, MERKLE-BRANCH-VERIFY allows script authors to force
redemption to use values selected from a pre-determined set committed
to in the scriptPubKey, but without requiring revelation of unused
elements in the set for both enhanced privacy and smaller script
sizes. Tail-call execution semantics allows a single level of
recursion into a subscript, providing properties similar to P2SH while
at the same time more flexible.
These two features together are enough to enable a range of
applications such as tree signatures (minus Schnorr aggregation) as
described by Pieter Wuille [1], and a generalized MAST useful for
constructing private smart contracts. It also brings privacy and
fungibility improvements to users of counter-signing wallet/vault
services as unique redemption policies need only be revealed if/when
exceptional circumstances demand it, leaving most transactions looking
the same as any other MAST-enabled multi-sig script.
I believe that the implementation of these features is simple enough,
and the use cases compelling enough that we could BIP 8/9 rollout of
these features in relatively short order, perhaps before the end of
the year.
I have written three BIPs to describe these features, and their
associated implementation, for which I now invite public review and
discussion:
Fast Merkle Trees
BIP: https://gist.github.com/maaku/41b0054de0731321d23e9da90ba4ee0a
Code: https://github.com/maaku/bitcoin/tree/fast-merkle-tree
MERKLEBRANCHVERIFY
BIP: https://gist.github.com/maaku/bcf63a208880bbf8135e453994c0e431
Code: https://github.com/maaku/bitcoin/tree/merkle-branch-verify
Tail-call execution semantics
BIP: https://gist.github.com/maaku/f7b2e710c53f601279549aa74eeb5368
Code: https://github.com/maaku/bitcoin/tree/tail-call-semantics
Note: I have circulated this idea privately among a few people, and I
will note that there is one piece of feedback which I agree with but
is not incorporated yet: there should be a multi-element MBV opcode
that allows verifying multiple items are extracted from a single
tree. It is not obvious how MBV could be modified to support this
without sacrificing important properties, or whether should be a
separate multi-MBV opcode instead.
Kind regards,
Mark Friedenbach
next reply other threads:[~2017-09-07 0:39 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 39+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2017-09-07 0:38 Mark Friedenbach [this message]
2017-09-08 9:21 ` Johnson Lau
2017-09-12 2:03 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-12 2:13 ` Bryan Bishop
2017-09-12 8:55 ` Johnson Lau
2017-09-12 19:57 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-12 23:27 ` Karl Johan Alm
2017-09-13 9:41 ` Peter Todd
2017-09-11 20:37 ` Adán Sánchez de Pedro Crespo
2017-09-19 0:46 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-19 3:09 ` [bitcoin-dev] cleanstack alt stack & softfork improvements (Was: Merkle branch verification & tail-call semantics for generalized MAST) Luke Dashjr
2017-09-19 7:33 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-22 20:32 ` Sergio Demian Lerner
2017-09-22 21:11 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-22 21:32 ` Sergio Demian Lerner
2017-09-22 21:39 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-22 21:54 ` Sergio Demian Lerner
2017-09-22 22:07 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-22 22:09 ` Pieter Wuille
2021-04-09 8:15 ` [bitcoin-dev] maximum block height on transaction Erik Aronesty
2021-04-09 11:39 ` Russell O'Connor
2021-04-09 15:54 ` Jeremy
2021-04-12 20:04 ` Billy Tetrud
2021-04-16 4:24 ` ZmnSCPxj
2021-05-03 2:30 ` ZmnSCPxj
2017-09-20 5:13 ` [bitcoin-dev] cleanstack alt stack & softfork improvements (Was: Merkle branch verification & tail-call semantics for generalized MAST) Johnson Lau
2017-09-20 19:29 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-09-21 3:58 ` Johnson Lau
2017-09-21 4:11 ` Luke Dashjr
2017-09-21 8:02 ` Johnson Lau
2017-09-21 16:33 ` Luke Dashjr
2017-09-21 17:38 ` Johnson Lau
2017-09-30 23:23 ` [bitcoin-dev] Merkle branch verification & tail-call semantics for generalized MAST Luke Dashjr
2017-09-30 23:51 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-10-02 17:15 ` Russell O'Connor
2017-10-28 4:40 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-11-01 8:43 ` Luke Dashjr
2017-11-01 15:08 ` Mark Friedenbach
2017-11-04 7:59 ` Luke Dashjr
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