Newsletters: add 343 (2025-02-28)

Author: harding

_posts/en/newsletters/2025-02-28-newsletter.md

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+---
+title: 'Bitcoin Optech Newsletter #343'
+permalink: /en/newsletters/2025/02/28/
+name: 2025-02-28-newsletter
+slug: 2025-02-28-newsletter
+type: newsletter
+layout: newsletter
+lang: en
+---
+This week's newsletter summarizes a post about having full nodes ignore
+transactions that are relayed without being requested first.  Also
+included are our regular sections with popular questions and answers
+from the Bitcoin Stack Exchange, announcements of new releases and
+release candidates, and summaries of notable changes to popular Bitcoin
+infrastructure software.
+
+## News
+
+- **Ignoring unsolicited transactions:** Antoine Riard [posted][riard
+  unsol] to Bitcoin-Dev two draft BIPs that would allow a node to signal
+  that it will no longer accept `tx` messages that it had not requested
+  using an `inv` message, called _unsolicited transactions_.  Riard
+  previously proposed the general idea in 2021 (see [Newsletter
+  #136][news136 unsol]).   The first proposed BIP adds a mechanism that
+  allows nodes to signal their transaction relay capabilities and
+  preferences; the second proposed BIP uses that signaling mechanism to
+  indicate that the node will ignore unsolicited transactions.
+
+  There are several small advantages to the proposal, as discussed in a
+  [Bitcoin Core pull request][bitcoin core #30572], but it conflicts
+  with the design of some older lightweight clients and could prevent
+  users of that software from being able to broadcast their
+  transactions, so a careful deployment might be required.  Although
+  Riard had opened the aforementioned pull request, he later closed it
+  after indicating that he planned to work on his own full node
+  implementation based on libbitcoinkernel.  He also indicated the
+  proposal may help address some attacks he recently disclosed (see
+  [Newsletter #332][news332 txcen]).
+
+## Selected Q&A from Bitcoin Stack Exchange
+
+*[Bitcoin Stack Exchange][bitcoin.se] is one of the first places Optech
+contributors look for answers to their questions---or when we have a
+few spare moments to help curious or confused users.  In
+this monthly feature, we highlight some of the top-voted questions and
+answers posted since our last update.*
+
+{% comment %}<!-- https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/search?tab=votes&q=created%3a1m..%20is%3aanswer -->{% endcomment %}
+{% assign bse = "https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/a/" %}
+
+## Releases and release candidates
+
+_New releases and release candidates for popular Bitcoin infrastructure
+projects.  Please consider upgrading to new releases or helping to test
+release candidates._
+
+- [Core Lightning 25.02rc3][] is a release candidate for the next major
+  version of this popular LN node.
+
+## Notable code and documentation changes
+
+_Notable recent changes in [Bitcoin Core][bitcoin core repo], [Core
+Lightning][core lightning repo], [Eclair][eclair repo], [LDK][ldk repo],
+[LND][lnd repo], [libsecp256k1][libsecp256k1 repo], [Hardware Wallet
+Interface (HWI)][hwi repo], [Rust Bitcoin][rust bitcoin repo], [BTCPay
+Server][btcpay server repo], [BDK][bdk repo], [Bitcoin Improvement
+Proposals (BIPs)][bips repo], [Lightning BOLTs][bolts repo],
+[Lightning BLIPs][blips repo], [Bitcoin Inquisition][bitcoin inquisition
+repo], and [BINANAs][binana repo]._
+
+- [Core Lightning #8116][] lightningd: redo closing negotiation even if we consider channel closed, see https://github.com/ElementsProject/lightning/pull/8116/commits/bc4a6591d30d5789f5955b7ed2863d2ed99599e0
+
+- [Core Lightning #8095][] setconfig: better handling of dynamic config vars
+
+- [Core Lightning #7772][] Update SCB on every commitment update and handle new format
+
+- [Core Lightning #8094][] xpay: add xpay-slow-mode to force waiting for all parts before returning.
+
+- [Eclair #2993][] Allow recipient to pay for blinded route fees
+
+- [LND #9491][] Allow coop closing a channel with HTLCs on it via lncli
+
+{% include snippets/recap-ad.md when="2025-03-04 15:30" %}
+{% include references.md %}
+{% include linkers/issues.md v=2 issues="30572,8116,8095,7772,8094,2993,9491" %}
+[riard unsol]: https://mailing-list.bitcoindevs.xyz/bitcoindev/[email protected]/
+[news136 unsol]: /en/newsletters/2021/02/17/#proposal-to-stop-processing-unsolicited-transactions
+[news332 txcen]: /en/newsletters/2024/12/06/#transaction-censorship-vulnerability
+[Core Lightning 25.02rc3]: https://github.com/ElementsProject/lightning/releases/tag/v25.02rc3