Upgraded Bitcoin software will first add Segregated Witness code

Rage Review : The expansion problem of Bitcoin blockchain has always been the crux of its wide applicability, so SegWit was proposed and tested many times. At present, it seems that this is still the most reasonable and effective way. Including the Thunder Network project previously announced by Blockchain, it will also integrate SegWit to try to solve the problem of slow transaction speed of Bitcoin blockchain. The latest news this month pointed out that the upcoming 0.13.1 version of Bitcoin software will add SegWit code; and in order to realize this function, most nodes must be upgraded.

Translation: Annie_Xu

The Bitcoin software is about to be upgraded again, and the Segregated Witness (SegWit) code will be added first. Later, in order to expand the number of transactions that the Bitcoin blockchain can handle, the code will be activated.

The newly added code for SegWit is being called the “most significant code change” in version 0.13.0 of the bitcoin software; however, the change is not intended to activate SegWit itself, but rather to eventually deploy it in version 0.13.1.

A software upgrade is expected to be released in the coming weeks.

Although the SegWit feature has been repeatedly tested, bitcoin developers hope to democratize testing by activating the feature on the bitcoin testnet and in “regression testing mode”; that is, allowing many developers to independently test it and submit potential issues and vulnerabilities.

Bitcoin Core developers believe that SegWit will be more secure and stable after adding these codes.

In order to solve Bitcoin's long-standing block size problem, developers proposed SegWit in December last year, hoping to maintain the original block size while increasing transaction volume; block size uses hard encryption to limit the amount of data that can be contained in a transaction block.

In order for the code change to be implemented, a soft fork must be initiated; the majority of nodes must be upgraded to make it compatible with the previous software version.

The software release also includes other code upgrade features, such as fee filtering that allows nodes to determine to whom to pass transactions; and compact block relay that can reduce the bandwidth required for blocks to propagate across the network.