Phoenix Wallet news

unfortunately, i could not find a thread for this wallet where all new features or updates are generally published and discussed - hence the creation of this thread

there has been a new function at the new Phoenix 2.3.1 release since yesterday.
bolt12 is finally supported and it is now possible to have statistical addresses (comparable to e-mail addresses) without needing your own domain.
so the sender/receiver will never have to ask anyone for an ln invoice again

https://github.com/ACINQ/phoenix/releases

I have a thread for lightning network wallets. Your contribution on the thread will be greatly appreciated.

Lists of open-source bitcoin lightning wallets

Phoenix was the first wallet on the list. Any wallet posted on the thread can be discussed about. Also new bitcoin lightning wallet can be talked about on the thread so that I can add it to the list.

For those who don't know, Bolt12 is superior to Bolt11 in two particular areas:

Reusable payment requests: You don't need to generate an entire new invoice which expires every time. That makes setting up a lightning wallet on the web much less complex. (For example, you can start receiving tips in your forum signature.)
Privacy: In Bolt11, the node ID of the receiver is disclosed, as opposed to Bolt12. This means that now, payments can be made privately by both parts.

ACINQ which are the developers of the Phoenix Wallet, are also one of the main developers of the Lighting Network itself. We can expect that whenever there is an upgrade to the Lighting network (for example to BOLT12), there should be seamless and timely integration for support in the Phoenix Wallet.

When I get some spare time (which isn't often), I might emulate Phoenix Wallet and perform some white-box security testing to see what it's like. It's been in development since 2019 and has a strong team around it though, so looks like a great option for mobile users.

Quote from: BlackHatCoiner on July 04, 2024, 11:45:58 AM

For those who don't know, Bolt12 is superior to Bolt11 in two particular areas:

Reusable payment requests: You don't need to generate an entire new invoice which expires every time. That makes setting up a lightning wallet on the web much less complex. (For example, you can start receiving tips in your forum signature.)
Privacy: In Bolt11, the node ID of the receiver is disclosed, as opposed to Bolt12. This means that now, payments can be made privately by both parts.

Yeah, BOLT12 effectively allows the invoice to be used by anyone as an "offer" - and doesn't need a specific destination. Kind of like a real invoice, just having a balance that needs to be paid, but it could be sent to anyone, or as you mentioned published in your BitcoinTalk signature for anyone to use. An extra benefit is that the reduction is data size required for the invoice. Might seem small on the surface, but long term it makes it more scalable.

Is this the same Phoenix wallet that is not allowing anyone from US to use it? Roll Eyes

Another thing should be mentioned about this wallet, they are advertising as Lightning Network wallet, but you have to set max on-chain fee when receiving LN payments.
That means that sometimes you will have to pay additional fees when receiving LN payments.
I think that Zeus wallet is currently better than Phoenix for Lightning, and they are not restricting anyone as far as I know.

Quote from: dkbit98 on July 11, 2024, 11:20:09 AM

Is this the same Phoenix wallet that is not allowing anyone from US to use it? Roll Eyes

Yes, it seems so. I assume, they decided to duck the hail of bullets fired by US institutions recently. Of course, US citizens aren't happy about it when they're affected.

Quote from: dkbit98 on July 11, 2024, 11:20:09 AM

Phoenix does automatic channel and inbound liquidity handling for users. When you create a LN invoice and you don't have enough inbound capacity to receive that payment, a new channel will be opened or an existing channels will have its inbound capacity extended (not sure, if you have a choice here). For this an on-chain transaction is required and fees as shown here: https://phoenix.acinq.co/faq#what-are-the-fees.
It's good that you can set a limit here to avoid unpleasant surprises in times of high on-chain fee levels.

I find Phoenix' approach of comfort to handle capacity management a somewhat good compromise especially for a non-custodial Lightning wallet.

It's worth noting, that their FAQ is pretty good in my opinion. It will hardly help someone who doesn't have much clue about how Lightning works, but for those who do know the basics, it's pretty decent. A lot of questions one might have about Phoenix' specific handling of things are addressed as far as I see it.

So far I didn't have bad experience with Phoenix wallet, but I haven't used it extensively. A few payments that failed with Wallet of Satoshi for me did work easily with Phoenix wallet. I didn't care much why, just my particular experience.

Someone released a desktop frontend for Phoenix called a Resurrection wallet.
This is released as open source non-custodial wallet, that works only on Linux OS for now.
I don't think this is officially supported by Phoenix wallet, so be careful and use it only for testing purposes.
https://github.com/ktecho/resurrection-wallet/releases