Bitcoin Client as a Service
Provides a higher-layer API as a Service for a local Bitcoin Core node via its RPC API. No support is provided for remote nodes nor SPV clients, neither are they expected to be in the future.
- objectorange (Brian Taylor) - GitHub | LinkedIn | brian@resolvingarchitecture.io PGP: 2FA3 9B12 DA50 BD7C E43C 3031 A15D FABB 2579 77DC
Project does not recognize copyright laws, licensing not required.
With plenty of BTC wallets on the market and Decentralized Exchanges, why build another Bitcoin Client?
Most wallets are questionably decentralized, the best arguably being Samourai Wallet. Samourai Wallet is an SPV wallet not using a full local node and the local Bitcoin Core wallet is difficult for the average internet user to use. In addition, current wallets are not very censorship-resistance through supporting proxies that can be used to route around network blocks. The ability to use other network protocols, e.g. Tor, I2P, Bluetooth, 1M5, LiFi needs to be supported.
BitcoinService is designed to work with the RA Service Bus. It sends and expects to receive messages using it. It currently depends on the ra.http.HTTPService running as a client only (for local Bitcoin node RPC).
BitcoinJ was evaluated to be embedded in the service. It creates an SPV Bitcoin node implemented in Java on your machine and connects out using DNS (TCP), HTTP, and Tor on its own terms. This is undesirable with this Bitcoin Client as a service as this should be the integrator's choice while also supporting a full/pruned node locally. The initial decision was to forego this library only connecting to a local Bitcoin Core node using its HTTP RPC interface. But this doesn't allow supporting end users where Bitcoin Core can not be installed very easily. Thus, this library is used when a local Bitcoin Core node is not detected yet extends the library to route all communications through the RA Network Manager Service so that multiple network protocols can be used to connect to remote Bitcoin Core nodes through supported network protocols.
Bitcoin JSON-RPC interface is used for all communications to the local Bitcoin node.
Local Bitcoin node can be a full node or a pruned node but when pruned, functionality will become limited. Open payment channels that will be de-referenced upon pruning will be lost due to de-referencing. It's recommended to keep the pruning to a minimum by supporting the largest bitcoin node size possible while minimizing how long payment channels are left open. Future versions of this component will provide auto notifications of payments channels that would be affected by a prune when registered with this service.
Ensure contents of bitcoin.conf provided in project config folder are in the bitcoin.conf file located in the .bitcoin directory within your home directory, e.g. ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf. This enables the JSON RPC - the ability for communications between the local Bitcoin node and this service.
- If your bitcoin node is not located in the following directory: /home/[username here]/snap/bitcoin-core/common/.bitcoin/ then set the bitcoin home directory by passing it in as the parameter: ra.btc.directory
- In bitcoin.conf, set the following:
- server=1
- rest=1
- rpcuser={username}
- rpcpassword={passphrase}
RPC operations implemented using the following API documentation: https://developer.bitcoin.org/reference/rpc/index.html
- Send and Receive Bitcoins via the local Bitcoin Core node verified.
- In progress
- Uses a modified BitcoinJ version where its network stack is replaced with the RA Network Manager
- TBD