If UASF activates, are blocks found by ASICBoost still valid on UASF nodes?

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If UASF activates, are blocks found by ASICBoost still valid on UASF nodes?

I understand that segwit is a softfork and that hence the segwit changes makes some blocks that were previously valid now invalid (including those using tx malleability).

I've got basically one question but I cannot formulate it well enough, so I'm breaking it into several questions.

Once segwit shall be activated, does it mean that ASIC miners using ASICBoost miners won't be able to mine on that chain at all anymore?

What about when UASF activates on august 1st 2017 (if it activates)? Does it mean that UASF nodes won't accept block found by ASIC miners using ASICBoost?

Are all the current ASICs using ASICBoost good for the trash should the UASF chain win?

Cedric Martin

Posted 2017-06-19T03:23:06.290

Reputation: 317

Answers

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Once segwit shall be activated, does it mean that ASIC miners using ASICBoost miners won't be able to mine on that chain at all anymore?

No. Nothing about segwit prevents miners from mining non-segwit blocks using ASICBOOST. Mining segwit blocks will slow down (and likely prevent) covert ASICBOOST from working, but miners can still use it and also use overt ASICBOOST if they want to.

What about when UASF activates on august 1st 2017 (if it activates)? Does it mean that UASF nodes won't accept block found by ASIC miners using ASICBoost?

No. It means that all blocks must signal for segwit so that segwit activates under the BIP 141 activation rules. This has nothing to do with ASICBOOST and does not require segwit commitments in blocks until after activation. After activation, segwit commitments are only required in blocks containing segwit transactions which not all miners must have in their blocks.

Are all the current ASICs using ASICBoost good for the trash should the UASF chain win?

No. Segwit itself does not prevent ASICBOOST. It only partially prevents covert ASICBOOST, and only for blocks that include the segwit commitment (i.e. blocks containing segwit transactions). In order for covert ASICBOOST to be blocked, all blocks would need to have a segwit commitment in them regardless of including segwit transactions, but that is not something that segwit specifies.

Andrew Chow

Posted 2017-06-19T03:23:06.290

Reputation: 40 910

1Furthermore, covert ASICBoost is not observable, so by definition the resulting blocks can't be made invalid as the blocks aren't distinguishable from others. At best, some changes may make the optimization useless (so using it just doesn't benefit the miner anymore), but as explained, BIP148 does not even do that. – Pieter Wuille – 2017-06-19T20:09:29.027

"It means that all blocks must signal for segwit so that segwit activates under the BIP 141 activation rules." Should that actually be BIP-148 instead of BIP-141? I thought BIP-141 only defined what SegWit, BIP-148, BIP-149, etc. deal with how it should be activated, right? – MrJLP – 2017-06-19T22:43:10.420

1No. BIP 141 contains the actual original segwit deployment parameters. BIP 148 is an extension on the BIP 141 deployment parameters. BIP 149 is an entirely different deployment that does not use BIP 9 deployment specifications. – Andrew Chow – 2017-06-19T22:45:54.377

Asked: 2017-06-19T03:23:06.290

Viewed: 104 times

Active: 2018-09-24T15:47:38.057