Following discussion with several wallet developers, I have come to the conclusion that the secondary goal of managing labels in non-specialized applications must be sacrificed in order to achieve the primary goal of wide implementation across different wallets. While this tradeoff was perhaps inevitable, it was worth a try! As such I have rewritten the specification to use JSON, specifically the JSON Lines format suggested by Ryan Havar and others (thank you). This allows documents to be split or streamed, and is convenient for command-line processing. The format is also now self describing via a type field, permitting simple type identification (thank you Ali Sherief and others). Public keys and xpubs have been added as types following further suggestions. To keep the specification simple, compression and encryption have been removed - with the strong recommendation to consider protecting the data in a way suitable to its application. The rewritten BIP can be found at https://github.com/craigraw/bips/blob/master/bip-wallet-labels.mediawiki It is perhaps simplest to understand it by looking at an example export: { "type": "tx", "ref": "f91d0a8a78462bc59398f2c5d7a84fcff491c26ba54c4833478b202796c8aafd", "label": "Transaction" } { "type": "addr", "ref": "bc1q34aq5drpuwy3wgl9lhup9892qp6svr8ldzyy7c", "label": "Address" } { "type": "pubkey", "ref": "0283409659355b6d1cc3c32decd5d561abaac86c37a353b52895a5e6c196d6f448", "label": "Public Key" } { "type": "input", "ref": "f91d0a8a78462bc59398f2c5d7a84fcff491c26ba54c4833478b202796c8aafd:0", "label": "Input" } { "type": "output", "ref": "f91d0a8a78462bc59398f2c5d7a84fcff491c26ba54c4833478b202796c8aafd:1", "label": "Output" } { "type": "xpub", "ref": "xpub661MyMwAqRbcFtXgS5sYJABqqG9YLmC4Q1Rdap9gSE8Nq...", "label": "Extended Public Key" } Feedback is always appreciated. Craig On Wed, Aug 24, 2022 at 11:18 AM Craig Raw wrote: > Hi all, > > I would like to propose a BIP that specifies a format for the export and > import of labels from a wallet. While transferring access to funds across > wallet applications has been made simple through standards such as BIP39, > wallet labels remain siloed and difficult to extract despite their value, > particularly in a privacy context. > > The proposed format is a simple two column CSV file, with the reference to > a transaction, address, input or output in the first column, and the label > in the second column. CSV was chosen for its wide accessibility, especially > to users without specific technical expertise. Similarly, the CSV file may > be compressed using the ZIP format, and optionally encrypted using AES. > > The full text of the BIP can be found at > https://github.com/craigraw/bips/blob/master/bip-wallet-labels.mediawiki > and also copied below. > > Feedback is appreciated. > > Thanks, > Craig Raw > > --- > > 
>   BIP: wallet-labels
>   Layer: Applications
>   Title: Wallet Labels Export Format
>   Author: Craig Raw 
>   Comments-Summary: No comments yet.
>   Comments-URI:
> https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/wiki/Comments:BIP-wallet-labels
>   Status: Draft
>   Type: Informational
>   Created: 2022-08-23
>   License: BSD-2-Clause
>
> > ==Abstract== > > This document specifies a format for the export of labels that may be > attached to the transactions, addresses, input and outputs in a wallet. > > ==Copyright== > > This BIP is licensed under the BSD 2-clause license. > > ==Motivation== > > The export and import of funds across different Bitcoin wallet > applications is well defined through standards such as BIP39, BIP32, BIP44 > etc. > These standards are well supported and allow users to move easily between > different wallets. > There is, however, no defined standard to transfer any labels the user may > have applied to the transactions, addresses, inputs or outputs in their > wallet. > The UTXO model that Bitcoin uses makes these labels particularly valuable > as they may indicate the source of funds, whether received externally or as > a result of change from a prior transaction. > In both cases, care must be taken when spending to avoid undesirable leaks > of private information. > Labels provide valuable guidance in this regard, and have even become > mandatory when spending in several Bitcoin wallets. > Allowing users to export their labels in a standardized way ensures that > they do not experience lock-in to a particular wallet application. > In addition, by using common formats, this BIP seeks to make manual or > bulk management of labels accessible to users without specific technical > expertise. > > ==Specification== > > In order to make the import and export of labels as widely accessible as > possible, this BIP uses the comma separated values (CSV) format, which is > widely supported by consumer, business, and scientific applications. > Although the technical specification of CSV in RFC4180 is not always > followed, the application of the format in this BIP is simple enough that > compatibility should not present a problem. > Moreover, the simplicity and forgiving nature of CSV (over for example > JSON) lends itself well to bulk label editing using spreadsheet and text > editing tools. > > A CSV export of labels from a wallet must be a UTF-8 encoded text file, > containing one record per line, with records containing two fields > delimited by a comma. > The fields may be quoted, but this is unnecessary, as the first comma in > the line will always be the delimiter. > The first line in the file is a header, and should be ignored on import. > Thereafter, each line represents a record that refers to a label applied > in the wallet. > The order in which these records appear is not defined. > > The first field in the record contains a reference to the transaction, > address, input or output in the wallet. > This is specified as one of the following: > * Transaction ID (txid) > * Address > * Input (rendered as txid) > * Output (rendered as txid>index or txid:index) > > The second field contains the label applied to the reference. > Exporting applications may omit records with no labels or labels of zero > length. > Files exported should use the .csv file extension. > > In order to reduce file size while retaining wide accessibility, the CSV > file may be compressed using the ZIP file format, using the .zip > file extension. > This .zip file may optionally be encrypted using either AES-128 > or AES-256 encryption, which is supported by numerous applications > including Winzip and 7-zip. > In order to ensure that weak encryption does not proliferate, importers > following this standard must refuse to import .zip files encrypted > with the weaker Zip 2.0 standard. > The textual representation of the wallet's extended public key (as defined > by BIP32, with an xpub header) should be used as the password. > > ==Importing== > > When importing, a naive algorithm may simply match against any reference, > but it is possible to disambiguate between transactions, addresses, inputs > and outputs. > For example in the following pseudocode: > 
>   if reference length < 64
>     Set address label
>   else if reference length == 64
>     Set transaction label
>   else if reference contains '<'
>     Set input label
>   else
>     Set output label
>
> > Importing applications may truncate labels if necessary. > > ==Test Vectors== > > The following fragment represents a wallet label export: > 
> Reference,Label
>
> c3bdad6e7dcd7997e16a5b7b7cf4d8f6079820ff2eedd5fcbb2ad088f767b37b‎,Transaction
> 1A69TXnEM2ms9fMaY9UuiJ7415X7xZaUSg,Address
> c3bdad6e7dcd7997e16a5b7b7cf4d8f6079820ff2eedd5fcbb2ad088f767b37b‎<0,Input
> c3bdad6e7dcd7997e16a5b7b7cf4d8f6079820ff2eedd5fcbb2ad088f767b37b‎>0,Output
> c3bdad6e7dcd7997e16a5b7b7cf4d8f6079820ff2eedd5fcbb2ad088f767b37b‎:0,Output
> (alternative)
>
> > ==Reference Implementation== > > TBD > > >