A new and improved Bitcoin Design Guide! The Bitcoin Design Community can’t stop, won’t stop. The V2 of the already phenomenal “Design Guide covers the Lightning Network. And promises to help “design better Lightning products faster with our free and open-source community-made handbook.” The BDC keeps adding value to the Bitcoin network and making the software developer’s job easier.
Related Reading | TALKING HEADS: Do You Consider The Lightning Network A Proof-Of-Stake System?
In a statement sent to Bitcoin Magazine, the community presented the changes in the new version of the Bitcoin Desing Guide by saying:
“Most users may begin their bitcoin journey with a Lightning wallet in the future. Lightning will cater to this majority with faster settlement speed, lower fees, and more user-friendly payment formats than on-chain. Version 2 of the Guide focuses on building these types of non-custodial Lightning products that people will come to rely on in the future.”
Why the focus on Lightning?
It's simple: as bitcoin usage grows, many users' first wallet experience will be on Lightning. pic.twitter.com/uNt6McKXwH— Bitcoin Design Community (@bitcoin_design) February 9, 2022
But that’s enough PR, let’s go to the actual content.
What’s New In The Bitcoin Design Guide V2?
- An updated Technology Primer to learn basic concepts.
- An updated onboarding section to learn about setups and backups.
- An overhauled payments section.
- Privacy and security in the Lightning Network: Backups; Protecting funds; and Privacy.
- The Bitcoin Design Guide is a work in progress and the BDC invites you to help.
Privacy and security are some of the most important considerations around bitcoin. Lightning introduces new challenges, which we discuss in multiple pages.
Backups: https://t.co/yaisGsIXAx
Protecting funds: https://t.co/uCmxa5gvO8
Privacy: https://t.co/haE9DfLE2M pic.twitter.com/b6r7r6B1t7
— Bitcoin Design Community (@bitcoin_design) February 9, 2022
The guide describes the Lightning Network as “a network of payment channels. Lightning nodes allow you to have multiple channels with different parties to route payments through. This new network forms a second layer on top of bitcoin and has some privacy benefits too since payments are not individually recorded on the blockchain.”
What Can You Tell Us About The Original Guide?
When Bitcoinist presented the first version of the Bitcoin Design Guide, we said:
“This is where the Bitcoin ethos really shines. These people produced a world-class product that fulfills a real-life need and released it for free. By doing it that way, the guide will improve countless non-custodial products and projects, raising the whole ecosystem’s level with just a nifty bit of sleight of hand.”
And we cleared up the limits of the project and its scope:
“The guide is still evolving, this is just the first public version. The intro makes the scope clear:
“Bitcoin’s use cases are as vast as its user base, building Bitcoin applications can be complicated.
We designed this guide to help anyone navigate those complexities—regardless of where they live or work. We can’t imagine every possible use case, but we can help you build for them.”
BTC price chart for 02/10/2022 on Bittrex | Source: BTC/USD on TradingView.com
Fusion With The Lightning Development Kit
The Bitcoin Design Community is sponsored by Spiral BTC. And Spiral’s first offering to the world is The Lightning Development Kit, that our sister site NewsBTC described as:
“The Lightning Development Kit is Spiral BTC’s latest offering to the community. And to the world. The LDK is “The simplest way to integrate Lightning into your Bitcoin wallet.” It’s free to use and it contains building blocks that anyone can merge with their product or application.”
The Bitcoin Design Guide takes care of the graphic part of things. Both products together are a powerful package for hungry developers looking to create the next Lightning app. And both are open-source.
Related Reading | CashApp Shocks The World, Enables Payments Through The Lightning Network
Conclusion And Guide
Bitcoin’s price might be all over the place, but the signal is clear. This is a committed community that’s improving the product every day. They are funded, they are organized, and they’re working together towards a common goal. Hyperbitcoinization.
Just to make sure everyone got it, here’s the Bitcoin Design Guide V2.
Featured Image: Bitcoin Design Guide V2 logo from this tweet | Charts by TradingView