Received: from sog-mx-1.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com ([172.29.43.191] helo=mx.sourceforge.net) by sfs-ml-1.v29.ch3.sourceforge.com with esmtp (Exim 4.76) (envelope-from ) id 1Wcfi8-0000Lq-3x for bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net; Tue, 22 Apr 2014 18:46:28 +0000 Received-SPF: pass (sog-mx-1.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com: domain of gmail.com designates 209.85.217.178 as permitted sender) client-ip=209.85.217.178; envelope-from=gmaxwell@gmail.com; helo=mail-lb0-f178.google.com; Received: from mail-lb0-f178.google.com ([209.85.217.178]) by sog-mx-1.v43.ch3.sourceforge.com with esmtps (TLSv1:RC4-SHA:128) (Exim 4.76) id 1Wcfi4-0001cg-Pl for bitcoin-development@lists.sourceforge.net; Tue, 22 Apr 2014 18:46:28 +0000 Received: by mail-lb0-f178.google.com with SMTP id s7so4640079lbd.37 for ; Tue, 22 Apr 2014 11:46:18 -0700 (PDT) MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Received: by 10.152.30.41 with SMTP id p9mr32267924lah.26.1398192378206; Tue, 22 Apr 2014 11:46:18 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.112.89.68 with HTTP; Tue, 22 Apr 2014 11:46:18 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: References: <1927948.OEZHQcsQ9n@crushinator> <2025496.b5Y3n7qx8B@crushinator> <1582E990-4E14-4EF7-9C9C-AA505B815104@bitsofproof.com> <53568B87.8040009@monetize.io> <11528A13-5D66-4D2B-BEE0-1C26F9987BC8@bitsofproof.com> Date: Tue, 22 Apr 2014 11:46:18 -0700 Message-ID: From: Gregory Maxwell To: Tamas Blummer Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 X-Spam-Score: -1.6 (-) 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 (gmaxwell[at]gmail.com) -0.0 SPF_PASS SPF: sender matches SPF record -0.1 DKIM_VALID_AU Message has a valid DKIM or DK signature from author's domain 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 X-Headers-End: 1Wcfi4-0001cg-Pl Cc: Bitcoin Dev Subject: Re: [Bitcoin-development] Presenting a BIP for Shamir's Secret Sharing of Bitcoin private keys 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: Tue, 22 Apr 2014 18:46:28 -0000 On Tue, Apr 22, 2014 at 11:29 AM, Tamas Blummer wrote: > Yes, it is current norm. I am questioning if we should hang on to it in > BIPs. > > I see testnet as a tool for a certain type of testing. Its existence is > likely a consequence of Satoshi not writing unit tests and having automated > integration tests, but creating a shadow chain to try things out, mostly > manually. Satoshi didn't create testnet. Testnet exists so you can do public tests involving multiple people and services, so you can have shadow versions of sites and services interacting with each other and trading worthless tokens. Importantly, testnet also creates a public live fire environment where grey hats can try out their attacks while minimizing damage (and it's been very successful at this). Testnet is not an alternative to the unit and integration tests that exist in Bitcoin core but exists for more or less completely different reasons. > Above leads me thinking that testnet is far less important than to be > addressed in every future BIP. Testnet is not normally addressed in BIPs at all, except for soft fork bips that had compressed deployment schedules on testnet. For address like specification we have always used a version byte and there is a common encoding for version bytes that flags the network ID in the byte.