[Bitcoin-development] [RFC] Canonical input and output ordering in transactions

[Mark Friedenbach]

Rusty, this doesn't play well with SIGHASH_SINGLE which is used in
assurance contracts among other things. Sometimes the ordering is set by
the signing logic itself...
On Jun 5, 2015 9:43 PM, "Rusty Russell" <rusty at rustcorp.com.au> wrote:

> Title: Canonical Input and Output Ordering
> Author: Rusty Russell <rusty at rustcorp.com.au>
> Discussions-To: "Bitcoin Dev" <bitcoin-development at lists.sourceforge.net>
> Status: Draft
> Type: Standards Track
> Created: 2015-06-06
>
> Abstract
>
> This BIP provides a canonical ordering of inputs and outputs when
> creating transactions.
>
> Motivation
>
> Most bitcoin wallet implementations randomize the outputs of
> transactions they create to avoid trivial linkage analysis (especially
> change outputs), however implementations have made mistakes in this area
> in the past.
>
> Using a canonical ordering has the same effect, but is simpler, more
> obvious if incorrect, and can eventually be enforced by IsStandard() and
> even a soft-fork to enforce it.
>
> Specification
>
> Inputs should be ordered like so:
>         index (lower value first)
>         txid (little endian order, lower byte first)
>
> Outputs should be ordered like so:
>         amount (lower value first)
>         script (starting from first byte, lower byte first, shorter wins)
>
> Rationale
>
> Any single wallet is already free to implement this, but if other
> wallets do not it would reduce privacy by making those transactions
> stand out.  Thus a BIP is appropriate, especially if this were to
> become an IsStandard() rule once widely adopted.
>
> Because integers are fast to compare, they're sorted first, before the
> lexographical ordering.
>
> The other input fields do not influence the sort order, as any valid
> transactions cannot have two inputs with the same index and txid.
>
> Reference Implementation
>
> https://github.com/rustyrussell/bitcoin/tree/bip-in-out-ordering
>
>
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