The Lightning Network FAQ

[ndalliard]

I am not sure what you consider long-term but there are different currencies and languages, and depending on where you are, it's you who need to adapt and not the other way around. You can try and shop with your dominant USD or EUR or whatever in a particular country and see how far that gets you. When I was doing some work in Germany a long time ago, I asked my boss if we can speak in English because I am fluent in English and still learning German. She said no! We speak German here. In other words, you can take your dominant English language and shove it. She just said it nicely.

i am talking longterm. like looooongterm. globalisation, the internet and so on exists for a really short time

wow such a great claim, did you know that you can get paid right now for your creation? as i said, the idea is stupid

So what? Since when is more competition not desirable? If I buy my groceries at shop #1, I should never enter shops #2 or #3 even if they have the same or better type of offers and should consider them stupid for trying?

competition is awesome. but shops are not networks. in a network you don't want competition. you don't want 10 different chat apps (maybe 10 different apps, but using the same network!!). 10 different languages. networks are about communication and again in the longterm we will settle on one way to communicate. for language and value

And for comparison: MySpace was a social media platform which was made before Facebook while no one uses it anymore. It turns out that the greatest implementation of each invention is what makes the difference.

myspace was not the network, the internet is!

the internet is the network for information and bitcoin is the network for value/truth

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[BlackHatCoiner]

myspace was not the network, the internet is!

I said that it's a social media platform, not a network protocol. Facebook is/was an alternative of MySpace and it got it over simply because the implementation of a social media platform was more dedicated than it was with MySpace. Same thing may happen with Zion and that activity pub you mentioned.

the internet is the network for information and bitcoin is the network for value/truth

Completely unrelated.

[ndalliard]

the internet is the network for information and bitcoin is the network for value/truth

Completely unrelated.

no it is not see below

myspace was not the network, the internet is!

I said that it's a social media platform, not a network protocol. Facebook is/was an alternative of MySpace and it got it over simply because the implementation of a social media platform was more dedicated than it was with MySpace. Same thing may happen with Zion and that activity pub you mentioned.

right - and what did facebook and myspace both use? which network?

edit: the network bitcoin uses the internet to transfer information, but adds the possibility to transfer value, which is not possible on the internet itself. what does zion add to the internet network?

[BlackHatCoiner]

right - and what did facebook and myspace both use? which network?

What does it matter?

what does zion add to the internet network?

Same thing Facebook & MySpace do.

[Rath_]

I haven’t explored the website yet, but a this is a social network platform built on the Lightning Network called “Zion”, https://getzion.com/

There is also Sphinx Chat. It's been around for quite a while and anyone with LND node can use it. It works on the same principle as Zion and offers similar features.

[cygan]

The growth of Bitcoin's Lightning network has exploded in recent weeks. Several key metrics used to measure the network size and connectivity have reached all-time highs.

https://www.btctimes.com/news/lightning-network-growth-changing-bitcoin-payment-narrative

and when the Bitcoin law comes into force in el salvador at the beginning of september, several ln's will follow

OpenNode, an industry-leading Bitcoin payment processor, announced today that Substack, an online publishing platform with over 500,000 paying subscribers, has integrated their Bitcoin API to offer Bitcoin payments on the online publishing platform. OpenNode will power both on-chain and Lightning Network Bitcoin payments.

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/substack-is-now-accepting-bitcoin-payments-on-the-lightning-network-powered-by-bitcoin-payment-processor-opennode-301360039.html

with Substrack there is another service that will now also support the lightning network

[ndalliard]

this seems to be moving into "The Lightning Network News"

[cygan]

this seems to be moving into "The Lightning Network News"

oh, okay. when searching, i only came across this ln thread and couldn't find a separate ln thread for news
i ask then the mods (gmaxwell & achow101) to move my post then in the appropriate ln-news-thread - thanks

[ndalliard]

this seems to be moving into "The Lightning Network News"

oh, okay. when searching, i only came across this ln thread and couldn't find a separate ln thread for news
i ask then the mods (gmaxwell & achow101) to move my post then in the appropriate ln-news-thread - thanks

Lightning Network Observer might be the news thread you are looking for - but don't quote me on that 

[Rath_]

this seems to be moving into "The Lightning Network News"

It's been like that for most of the time anyway.

Zion's github mentioned it's Relay forked from Sphinx protocol, i wonder if they're talking about protocol used for Sphinx Chat?

Yes, they are. Relay is actually what you need if you want your node to be able to work with Sphinx Chat.

[Wind_FURY]

I haven’t explored the website yet, but a this is a social network platform built on the Lightning Network called “Zion”, https://getzion.com/

I don’t know how it works or if it’s required that you run your own node, I hope it doesn’t have that requirement for low entry barrier for new users.

this is a pretty stupid idea... there is already activity pub for example, why reinvent the wheel? for what?

It’s actually not. Whether Zion becomes a success, or a failure, it development can be used as an illustration of what can be built on top of the Lightning Network. But I’m the stupid one, maybe you’re right, or maybe my stupid and the idea’s stupid negates the stupid. - x - = +.

Lighning keeps growing, https://twitter.com/BitcoinIsaiah/status/1429983900043038721

[darkv0rt3x]

Hello.

I just wanted to make this available here as I'm not sure many of us are aware of this recent feature in C-Lightning nodes.
This is about the experimental feature of dual funding channels and advertising liquidity to the network.
There are some instructions on how to setup it up and configurations needed.

Hope it captivates interest of more C-Lightning users and help the network to grow, even for a bit!

https://medium.com/blockstream/setting-up-liquidity-ads-in-c-lightning-54e4c59c091d

[Carlton Banks]

I just wanted to make this available here as I'm not sure many of us are aware of this recent feature in C-Lightning nodes.

yes, a few people started talking about dual-funding in this thread a couple months back, some even used it to make channels (apparently)

it's still accessed using --experimental-features in c-lightning, so craeful craeful etc

[ndalliard]

I just wanted to make this available here as I'm not sure many of us are aware of this recent feature in C-Lightning nodes.

yes, a few people started talking about dual-funding in this thread a couple months back, some even used it to make channels (apparently)

it's still accessed using --experimental-features in c-lightning, so craeful craeful etc

rath and me used it to open a channel and i think he used it again with someone else. even though it is marked as experimental, i think it is save to use. at least i haven't heard of any problems so far

[Carlton Banks]

rath and me used it to open a channel and i think he used it again with someone else. even though it is marked as experimental, i think it is save to use. at least i haven't heard of any problems so far

well, yeah. It's just new is all, any bugs are not currently obvious, but that doesn't mean there aren't bugs. Time helps to be sure(r).

[darkv0rt3x]

rath and me used it to open a channel and i think he used it again with someone else. even though it is marked as experimental, i think it is save to use. at least i haven't heard of any problems so far

well, yeah. It's just new is all, any bugs are not currently obvious, but that doesn't mean there aren't bugs. Time helps to be sure(r).

As is pretty much everything in LN. So, if we follow the rules by the book, I think we are kind of safe.
I opened a dual funded channel myself with _Rath and I have now my node setup to advertise my available liquidity.

Everything seems fine so far. And if there is no one to use and to be the ones finding bugs and problems, then, we will never evolve.

[n0nce]

Hey LN friends, I'm a c-lightning user for around half a year now, and I'm seriously debating about switching to lnd instead. What do you guys think is the cleaner solution? And what is the more commonly used implementation here?
I just hate hacked-together solutions and dirty code, since those are precursors of failed projects in 5-10 years time max.

I personally much prefer C over Go, and I hate Docker. Additionally, I noticed c-lightning was structured in a more minimalistic way for core functinality, with plugins for additional functionalities like HTTPS API etc., whereas in lnd it's all built-in - this to me at first sounds like bloat! Which I also hate! So I naturally went with c-lightning.

However, after a while of using the node and interacting with it, I noticed the plugin interface isn't as clean and bloat-free as I hoped: some plugins require me to install Node JS , they're all written in tons of different languages and often totally unmaintained for years.

So now, I'm thinking to deploy a new node, running lnd and trying to install it without Docker, straight from source.
Interested to hear your opinions and experiences!

[ndalliard]

Hey LN friends, I'm a c-lightning user for around half a year now, and I'm seriously debating about switching to lnd instead. What do you guys think is the cleaner solution? And what is the more commonly used implementation here?
I just hate hacked-together solutions and dirty code, since those are precursors of failed projects in 5-10 years time max.

welcome n0nce to the c-lightning users, i am one too. if you mean here in the forum i am not sure, we maybe could make a poll for that at one point, but in general lnd seems to be used a lot more and has also the bigger community it seems

I personally much prefer C over Go, and I hate Docker. Additionally, I noticed c-lightning was structured in a more minimalistic way for core functinality, with plugins for additional functionalities like HTTPS API etc., whereas in lnd it's all built-in - this to me at first sounds like bloat! Which I also hate! So I naturally went with c-lightning.

pretty much the reasons i also went with c-lightning

also especially because it seems that everyone is using lnd i went with c-lightning, cause i think it is important to have some diversity. i also see that on developer calls, that the 3 (or 4 if you count the rust implementation) implementations help each other to find bugs and be compliant with the rfcs. i just went with the minority (and not eclair cause that is written in java/scala which sounds bloat to me)

However, after a while of using the node and interacting with it, I noticed the plugin interface isn't as clean and bloat-free as I hoped: some plugins require me to install Node JS , they're all written in tons of different languages and often totally unmaintained for years.

because the community / number of developers around c-lightning is much smaller than for lnd, some plugins are rotting away, but i like the fact, that a developer is free to choose his prefered language to write a plugin and is not forced to use go for it. i agree with you, i try to avoid nodejs and i am even hesitant using python in some cases (that might be a little bit extreme on my part)

So now, I'm thinking to deploy a new node, running lnd and trying to install it without Docker, straight from source.
Interested to hear your opinions and experiences!

rath_ switched from lnd to c-lightning - i asked him the following:

@Rath: did you ever write in the forum about the topic lnd vs c-lightning and why you made the switch from one to the other? might be interesting for others (it was for me) - we need that lightning network subforum. can i do anything to make that happen?

We discussed it in this topic. Check out this post first and then take a look at the 39th page. As for the subforum, there is nothing we can do beside waiting and talking about Lightning as usual.

i am happy with c-lightning atm and don't feel like switching


i stumbled the other day about this github issue for lnd. it seems that lnd doesn't run on 32 bit systems, after the size of the database gets bigger than 1 gb. and the last commenter there mentions that raspbian (used on raspberrypies) is a 32 bit system) - something to keep in mind when you run lightning on a rpi

[n0nce]

Hey LN friends, I'm a c-lightning user for around half a year now, and I'm seriously debating about switching to lnd instead. What do you guys think is the cleaner solution? And what is the more commonly used implementation here?
I just hate hacked-together solutions and dirty code, since those are precursors of failed projects in 5-10 years time max.

welcome n0nce to the c-lightning users, i am one too. if you mean here in the forum i am not sure, we maybe could make a poll for that at one point, but in general lnd seems to be used a lot more and has also the bigger community it seems

Thanks a lot, ndalliard! A poll would be fun, just to get a general idea I had the same impression of a larger lnd user base though.

also especially because it seems that everyone is using lnd i went with c-lightning, cause i think it is important to have some diversity. i also see that on developer calls, that the 3 (or 4 if you count the rust implementation) implementations help each other to find bugs and be compliant with the rfcs. i just went with the minority (and not eclair cause that is written in java/scala which sounds bloat to me)

Yep, that's true, I really like how the implementation teams work together, also joined a "Lightning Specification Meeting" once to see how it's like, very interesting. And surely, diversity helps. But to me, right now, c-lightning (unintuitively) seems less clean than lnd. This might change once I try it, so I'll do that as soon as I find the time, while keeping my existing node up for the time being...

However, after a while of using the node and interacting with it, I noticed the plugin interface isn't as clean and bloat-free as I hoped: some plugins require me to install Node JS , they're all written in tons of different languages and often totally unmaintained for years.

because the community / number of developers around c-lightning is much smaller than for lnd, some plugins are rotting away, but i like the fact, that a developer is free to choose his prefered language to write a plugin and is not forced to use go for it. i agree with you, i try to avoid nodejs and i am even hesitant using python in some cases (that might be a little bit extreme on my part)

Yeah, that makes sense, however I would have much preferred all plugins to be in C. I mean that's kind of the reason various implementations exist, imagine the next c-lightning plugin to be coded in Go - that would be quite ironic wouldn't it
I myself like Python quite a lot, but wouldn't write a c-lightning plugin in it for sure. Unfortunately one plugin I needed was only available as a NodeJS implementation and that really sucks, I even have to start it manually after a reboot for example due to node (or I did something wrong, no time for further investigation so far).
Like, let's be honest: NodeJS is more bloat than the whole of lnd, so there's no real point of c-lightning if you need a single node plugin for it.

i stumbled the other day about this github issue for lnd. it seems that lnd doesn't run on 32 bit systems, after the size of the database gets bigger than 1 gb. and the last commenter there mentions that raspbian (used on raspberrypies) is a 32 bit system) - something to keep in mind when you run lightning on a rpi

Oh, that's very good to know! My node is based on a repurposed laptop motherboard, the Pi synched way too slowly for my liking and I had it sitting around.. But keeping it in mind! Since I might instead of replacing my old node, instead deploy a second on a Pi....

~

Came here via link from @Rath_, thanks for your insight! I'm now wondering: if lnd is so resource-heavy and Google-based, what about the rust implementation? Rust is supposed to be a c-alternative ("you can write bootloaders in Rust") etc., and focuses more on being resource friendly, as far as I know. Any opinions and experiences in this thread here? As far as I know it's kind of a "Lightning Core" and something is needed around it to have an actual node, didn't look much deeper into it yet though.

[Carlton Banks]

if lnd is so resource-heavy and Google-based

there are (were?) unknown bugs causing lnd to be resource heavy. In principle, it should be as low impact as a lightning client written in C, but not at all in practice

I don't know if the bugs are in the Go runtime/compiler, or in LND itself. When I wrote that comment, neither did anyone at lightning labs
 

what about the rust implementation? Rust is supposed to be a c-alternative ("you can write bootloaders in Rust")

actual rust-lightning is not production-ready last I heard.


I don't really get your issue about the language/dependencies for c-lightning plugins; just don't use any plugin you don't like?