Evolutionist,
We continue our examination of the Bitcoin White Paper, released by Satoshi Nakamoto in October of 2008, focusing on section five, the network.
Nodes (computers) worldwide are connected on the Bitcoin Network, listening for new transactions and blocks. As Bitcoin transactions happen, they are broadcasted and organized into upcoming blocks. You can see pending transactions by looking at the Mempool.
As new blocks are created, they are broadcasted to the nodes that review all transactions for accuracy. If the block is valid, the nodes accept the block, add it to the chain, and begin to work on the next block by using the hash from the block just received.
Not all nodes will receive all broadcasted messages, but all nodes will recognize the longest chain as the most accurate. Nodes will request missing transactions or blocks to maintain their updated records. This ensures the network stays honest and up to date.
For more information, click on the illustration below or one of the links to previous newsletters in this series.
The Bitcoin White Paper Series:
#4 - Section: Timestamp Server
To the moon!
Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
Network
The steps to run the network are as follows:
1) New transactions are broadcast to all nodes.
2) Each node collects new transactions into a block.
3) Each node works on finding a difficult proof-of-work for its block.
4) When a node finds a proof-of-work, it broadcasts the block to all nodes.
5) Nodes accept the block only if all transactions in it are valid and not already spent.
6) Nodes express their acceptance of the block by working on creating the next block in the chain, using the hash of the accepted block as the previous hash.
Nodes always consider the longest chain to be the correct one and will keep working on extending it. If two nodes broadcast different versions of the next block simultaneously, some nodes may receive one or the other first. In that case, they work on the first one they received, but save the other branch in case it becomes longer. The tie will be broken when the next proof-of-work is found and one branch becomes longer; the nodes that were working on the other branch will then switch to the longer one.
New transaction broadcasts do not necessarily need to reach all nodes. As long as they reach many nodes, they will get into a block before long. Block broadcasts are also tolerant of dropped messages. If a node does not receive a block, it will request it when it receives the next block and realizes it missed one.
Node: A data point or device within a more extensive network. Any computer connected to the Bitcoin network is referred to as a node, and those that fully enforce all of Bitcoin’s rules are referred to as “full nodes.”
🔥🔥SUBSCRIBER PERK 🔥🔥
All evolutionists will receive a free digital copy of my upcoming book: title and release date set for Q3 of 2022.