Received: from sog-mx-4.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com ([172.29.43.194] helo=mx.sourceforge.net) by sfs-ml-1.v29.ch3.sourceforge.com with esmtp (Exim 4.76) (envelope-from ) id 1SdrDm-0005fN-9N for bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net; Sun, 10 Jun 2012 23:06:58 +0000 Received-SPF: pass (sog-mx-4.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com: domain of gmail.com designates 209.85.217.175 as permitted sender) client-ip=209.85.217.175; envelope-from=mh.in.england@gmail.com; helo=mail-lb0-f175.google.com; Received: from mail-lb0-f175.google.com ([209.85.217.175]) by sog-mx-4.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com with esmtps (TLSv1:RC4-SHA:128) (Exim 4.76) id 1SdrDl-0002zu-EJ for bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net; Sun, 10 Jun 2012 23:06:58 +0000 Received: by lbol5 with SMTP id l5so2796666lbo.34 for ; Sun, 10 Jun 2012 16:06:50 -0700 (PDT) MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.152.105.51 with SMTP id gj19mr15320212lab.38.1339369610853; Sun, 10 Jun 2012 16:06:50 -0700 (PDT) Sender: mh.in.england@gmail.com Received: by 10.114.10.5 with HTTP; Sun, 10 Jun 2012 16:06:50 -0700 (PDT) Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2012 01:06:50 +0200 X-Google-Sender-Auth: GGEa9VXTCvdjqOoYgC4WINdfWgk Message-ID: From: Mike Hearn To: Bitcoin Dev Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 X-Spam-Score: -1.0 (-) X-Spam-Report: Spam Filtering performed by mx.sourceforge.net. See http://spamassassin.org/tag/ for more details. -1.5 SPF_CHECK_PASS SPF reports sender host as permitted sender for sender-domain 0.0 FREEMAIL_FROM Sender email is commonly abused enduser mail provider (mh.in.england[at]gmail.com) -0.0 SPF_PASS SPF: sender matches SPF record 0.1 DKIM_SIGNED Message has a DKIM or DK signature, not necessarily valid -0.1 DKIM_VALID Message has at least one valid DKIM or DK signature 0.5 AWL AWL: From: address is in the auto white-list X-Headers-End: 1SdrDl-0002zu-EJ Subject: [Bitcoin-development] Bootstrapping full nodes post-pruning X-BeenThere: bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.9 Precedence: list List-Id: List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 10 Jun 2012 23:06:58 -0000 Apologies if this has been discussed elsewhere. I don't recall us ever reaching a solid conclusion on it. A node that has pruned its block chain cannot serve the chain to new nodes. So there are three options for bootstrapping a newly installed node: 1) Have some kind of special archival nodes that never prune (advertised via the services field?). Encourage people to run them, somehow. 2) Ship a post-pruning block chain and tx index with the client downloads, so the client starts up already bootstrapped. 3) Some combination of both. It's safe to assume some people will keep unpruned chains around no matter what. But for many users (2) is easiest and archival nodes would be put under less load if they were used only by users who wish to fully bootstrap from only the code. I remember some people, Greg in particular, who were not a fan of approach (2) at all, though it has the benefit of speeding startup for new users as there's no indexing overhead.