Date: Wed, 30 Dec 2015 19:00:43 +0000
From: Bob McElrath <bob_bitcoin@mcelrath.org>
To: joe2015@openmailbox.org
Message-ID: <20151230190043.GJ18200@mcelrath.org>
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	<e170f3a10164019824edaafe5a04f067@xbt.hk>
	<f9ad1348fb7dedca35b594782fee7e0f@openmailbox.org>
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Cc: bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org
Subject: Re: [bitcoin-dev] Increasing the blocksize as a (generalized)
 softfork.
Precedence: list

joe2015--- via bitcoin-dev [bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org] wrote:
> That's the whole point.  After a conventional hardfork everyone
> needs to upgrade, but there is no way to force users to upgrade.  A
> user who is simply unaware of the fork, or disagrees with the fork,
> uses the old client and the currency splits.
> 
> Under this proposal old clients effectively enter "zombie" mode,
> forcing users to upgrade.

This is a very complex way to enter zombie mode.

A simpler way is to track valid PoW chains by examining only the header, that
are rejected for other reasons.

Once a chain is seen to be 6 or more blocks ahead of my chain tip, we should
enter "zombie mode" and refuse to mine or relay, and alert the operator, because
we don't know what we're doing and we're out of date.  This way doesn't require
any modifications to block structure at all.

--
Cheers, Bob McElrath

"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong."
    -- H. L. Mencken