Offline mode

[LoyceV]

As far as how Bitcoin Core leaves the addresses visible, I have mentioned how this is a mistake before. I remember someone making an argument about this which was not convincing at all. If someone finds the wallet.dat file for some reason, and the see the funds

If someone gets their hands on your wallet, your security has already failed.

But ultimately you always want to store your wallets encrypted with an encryption software on top of it.

If that makes you feel better, nobody is stopping you

On a technical level, I don't even think it would be possible for Bitcoin Core to run without knowing your wallet addresses. With each new block, it updates your wallet based on all new transactions on the blockchain. If it wouldn't know your addresses, it would have to "rewind" all blocks when you unlock your wallet. That's going to take a while, and could even make pruning impossible if you barely open your wallet.

[ABCbits]

So my question is, given that 2) does not require an internet connection, is it possible to stop this instance of Bitcoin Core from trying to connect to the internet? Perhaps there is an -offline mode where it can be launched without any internet features enabled? I just find it annoying that it is stuck trying to sync the blockchain. It doesn't feel right that the software is unnecessarily querying to connect in order to start downloading blocks.
If such mode does not exist then they should add an offline mode for airgap laptop setup.

How about adding networkactive=0 to bitcoin.conf?

On a technical level, I don't even think it would be possible for Bitcoin Core to run without knowing your wallet addresses. With each new block, it updates your wallet based on all new transactions on the blockchain. If it wouldn't know your addresses, it would have to "rewind" all blocks when you unlock your wallet. That's going to take a while, and could even make pruning impossible if you barely open your wallet.

For additional context, OP have raised his concern on Hide the public keys on wallet.dat files.

[takuma sato]

So my question is, given that 2) does not require an internet connection, is it possible to stop this instance of Bitcoin Core from trying to connect to the internet? Perhaps there is an -offline mode where it can be launched without any internet features enabled? I just find it annoying that it is stuck trying to sync the blockchain. It doesn't feel right that the software is unnecessarily querying to connect in order to start downloading blocks.
If such mode does not exist then they should add an offline mode for airgap laptop setup.

How about adding networkactive=0 to bitcoin.conf?

On a technical level, I don't even think it would be possible for Bitcoin Core to run without knowing your wallet addresses. With each new block, it updates your wallet based on all new transactions on the blockchain. If it wouldn't know your addresses, it would have to "rewind" all blocks when you unlock your wallet. That's going to take a while, and could even make pruning impossible if you barely open your wallet.

For additional context, OP have raised his concern on Hide the public keys on wallet.dat files.

I will be adding networkactive=0 to the bitcoin.conf file, it's better than nothing I guess. At least it will stop being annoying trying to update blocks constantly. I still believe there should be better support for those of us that use it as a wallet for cold storage. If you want people using the software more you must accomodate a bit those things. I have heard of alternatives like Sparrow Wallet but I just don't want to add additional complexity and want to stay 100% BTC Core.

About the link you posted, I still believe we should have better support for generating .psbt files. We need to be able to select utxos on Coin Control and then generate the .psbt file from those selected inputs to easily choose that coins to spend, but I don't see a way to do this at least with the GUI.