Bitcoin wire format

This page is for organizations who want to be able to create and send name operation transactions to the blockchain(s) Blockstack supports. It describes the transaction formats for the Bitcoin blockchain.

Transaction format
Payload Format
Method Glossary

Transaction format

Each Bitcoin transaction for Blockstack contains signatures from two sets of keys: the name owner, and the payer. The owner scriptSig and scriptPubKey fields are generated from the key(s) that own the given name. The payer scriptSig and scriptPubKey fields are used to subsidize the operation. The owner keys do not pay for any operations; the owner keys only control the minimum amount of BTC required to make the transaction standard. The payer keys only pay for the transaction’s fees, and (when required) they pay the name fee.

This construction is meant to allow the payer to be wholly separate from the owner. The principal that owns the name can fund their own transactions, or they can create a signed transaction that carries out the desired operation and request some other principal (e.g. a parent organization) to actually pay for and broadcast the transaction.

The general transaction layout is as follows:

Inputs	Outputs
Owner scriptSig (1)	`OP_RETURN <payload>` (2)
Payment scriptSig	Owner scriptPubKey (3)
Payment scriptSig… (4)
… (4)	… (5)

(1) The owner scriptSig is always the first input. (2) The OP_RETURN script that describes the name operation is always the first output. (3) The owner scriptPubKey is always the second output. (4) The payer can use as many payment inputs as (s)he likes. (5) At most one output will be the “change” scriptPubKey for the payer. Different operations require different outputs.

Payload Format

Each Blockstack transaction in Bitcoin describes the name operation within an OP_RETURN output. It encodes name ownership, name fees, and payments as scriptPubKey outputs. The specific operations are described below.

Each OP_RETURN payload always starts with the two-byte string id (called the “magic” bytes in this document), followed by a one-byte op that describes the operation.

NAME_PREORDER

Op: ?

Description: This transaction commits to the hash of a name. It is the first transaction of two transactions that must be sent to register a name in BNS.

Example: 6730ae09574d5935ffabe3dd63a9341ea54fafae62fde36c27738e9ee9c4e889

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0     2  3                                                  23             39
    |-----|--|--------------------------------------------------|--------------|
    magic op  hash_name(name.ns_id,script_pubkey,register_addr)   consensus hash

Inputs:

Payment scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
Payment scriptPubkey script for change
p2pkh scriptPubkey to the burn address (0x00000000000000000000000000000000000000)

Notes:

register_addr is a base58check-encoded ripemd160(sha256(pubkey)) (i.e. an address). This address must not have been used before in the underlying blockchain.
script_pubkey is either a p2pkh or p2sh compiled Bitcoin script for the payer’s address.

NAME_REGISTRATION

Op: :

Description: This transaction reveals the name whose hash was announced by a previous NAME_PREORDER. It is the second of two transactions that must be sent to register a name in BNS.

Example: 55b8b42fc3e3d23cbc0f07d38edae6a451dfc512b770fd7903725f9e465b2925

OP_RETURN wire format (2 variations allowed):

Variation 1:

    0    2  3                             39
    |----|--|-----------------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes)

Variation 2:

    0    2  3                                  39                  59
    |----|--|----------------------------------|-------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes, 0-padded)       value

Inputs:

Payer scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
scriptPubkey for the owner’s address
scriptPubkey for the payer’s change

Notes:

Variation 1 simply registers the name. Variation 2 will register the name and set a name value simultaneously. This is used in practice to set a zone file hash for a name without the extra NAME_UPDATE transaction.
Both variations are supported. Variation 1 was designed for the time when Bitcoin only supported 40-byte OP_RETURN outputs.

NAME_RENEWAL

Op: :

Description: This transaction renews a name in BNS. The name must still be registered and not expired, and owned by the transaction sender.

Example: e543211b18e5d29fd3de7c0242cb017115f6a22ad5c6d51cf39e2b87447b7e65

OP_RETURN wire format (2 variations allowed):

Variation 1:

    0    2  3                             39
    |----|--|-----------------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes)

Variation 2:

    0    2  3                                  39                  59
    |----|--|----------------------------------|-------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes, 0-padded)       value

Inputs:

Payer scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
scriptPubkey for the owner’s addess. This can be a different address than the current name owner (in which case, the name is renewed and transferred).
scriptPubkey for the payer’s change
scriptPubkey for the burn address (to pay the name cost)

Notes:

This transaction is identical to a NAME_REGISTRATION, except for the presence of the fourth output that pays for the name cost (to the burn address).
Variation 1 simply renews the name. Variation 2 will both renew the name and set a new name value (in practice, the hash of a new zone file).
Both variations are supported. Variation 1 was designed for the time when Bitcoin only supported 40-byte OP_RETURN outputs.
This operation can be used to transfer a name to a new address by setting the second output (the first scriptPubkey) to be the scriptPubkey of the new owner key.

NAME_UPDATE

Op: +

Description: This transaction sets the name state for a name to the given value. In practice, this is used to announce new DNS zone file hashes to the Atlas network.

Example: e2029990fa75e9fc642f149dad196ac6b64b9c4a6db254f23a580b7508fc34d7

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0     2  3                                   19                      39
    |-----|--|-----------------------------------|-----------------------|
    magic op  hash128(name.ns_id,consensus hash)      zone file hash

Note that hash128(name.ns_id, consensus hash) is the first 16 bytes of a SHA256 hash over the name concatenated to the hexadecimal string of the consensus hash (not the bytes corresponding to that hex string). See the Method Glossary below.

Example: hash128("jude.id" + "8d8762c37d82360b84cf4d87f32f7754") == "d1062edb9ec9c85ad1aca6d37f2f5793".

Inputs:

owner scriptSig
payment scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
owner’s scriptPubkey
payment scriptPubkey change

NAME_TRANSFER

Op: >

Description: This transaction changes the public key hash that owns the name in BNS.

Example: 7a0a3bb7d39b89c3638abc369c85b5c028d0a55d7804ba1953ff19b0125f3c24

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0     2  3    4                   20              36
    |-----|--|----|-------------------|---------------|
    magic op keep  hash128(name.ns_id) consensus hash
             data?

Inputs:

Owner scriptSig
Payment scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
new name owner’s scriptPubkey
old name owner’s scriptPubkey
payment scriptPubkey change

Notes:

The keep data? byte controls whether or not the name’s 20-byte value is preserved. This value is either > to preserve it, or ~ to delete it.

NAME_REVOKE

Op: ~

Description: This transaction destroys a registered name. Its name state value in BNS will be cleared, and no further transactions will be able to affect the name until it expires (if its namespace allows it to expire at all).

Example: eb2e84a45cf411e528185a98cd5fb45ed349843a83d39fd4dff2de47adad8c8f

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0    2  3                             39
    |----|--|-----------------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes)

Inputs:

owner scriptSig
payment scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
owner scriptPubkey
payment scriptPubkey change

ANNOUNCE

Op: #

Description: This transaction does not affect any names in BNS, but it allows a user to send a message to other BNS nodes. In order for the message to be received, the following must be true:

The sender must have a BNS name
The BNS nodes must list the sender’s BNS name as being a “trusted message sender”
The message must have already been propagated through the Atlas network. This transaction references it by content hash.

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0    2  3                             23
    |----|--|-----------------------------|
    magic op   ripemd160(sha256(message))

Inputs:

The payer scriptSig’s

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
change scriptPubKey

Notes:

The payer key should be an owner key for an existing name, since Blockstack users can subscribe to announcements from specific name-owners.

NAMESPACE_PREORDER

Op: *

Description: This transaction announces the hash of a new namespace. It is the first of three transactions that must be sent to create a namespace.

Example: 5f00b8e609821edd6f3369ee4ee86e03ea34b890e242236cdb66ef6c9c6a1b28

OP_RETURN wire format:

   0     2   3                                         23               39
   |-----|---|-----------------------------------------|----------------|
   magic op  hash_name(ns_id,script_pubkey,reveal_addr)   consensus hash

Inputs:

Namespace payer scriptSig

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
Namespace payer scriptPubkey change address
p2pkh script to the burn address 1111111111111111111114oLvT2, whose public key hash is 0x00000000000000000000000000000000

Notes:

The reveal_addr field is the address of the namespace revealer public key. The revealer private key will be used to generate NAME_IMPORT transactions.

NAMESPACE_REVEAL

Op: &

Description: This transaction reveals the namespace ID and namespace rules for a previously-anounced namespace hash (sent by a previous NAMESPACE_PREORDER).

Example: ab54b1c1dd5332dc86b24ca2f88b8ca0068485edf0c322416d104c5b84133a32

OP_RETURN wire format:

   0     2   3        7     8     9    10   11   12   13   14    15    16    17       18        20                        39
   |-----|---|--------|-----|-----|----|----|----|----|----|-----|-----|-----|--------|----------|-------------------------|
   magic  op  life    coeff. base 1-2  3-4  5-6  7-8  9-10 11-12 13-14 15-16  nonalpha  version   namespace ID
                                                     bucket exponents         no-vowel
                                                                              discounts

Inputs:

Namespace payer scriptSigs

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
namespace revealer scriptPubkey
namespace payer change scriptPubkey

Notes:

This transaction must be sent within 1 day of the NAMESPACE_PREORDER
The second output (with the namespace revealer) must be a p2pkh script
The address of the second output must be the reveal_addr in the NAMESPACE_PREORDER

Pricing:

The rules for a namespace are as follows:

a name can fall into one of 16 buckets, measured by length. Bucket 16 incorporates all names at least 16 characters long.
the pricing structure applies a multiplicative penalty for having numeric characters, or punctuation characters.
the price of a name in a bucket is ((coeff) * (base) ^ (bucket exponent)) / ((numeric discount multiplier) * (punctuation discount multiplier))

Example:

base = 10
coeff = 2
nonalpha discount: 10
no-vowel discount: 10
buckets 1, 2: 9
buckets 3, 4, 5, 6: 8
buckets 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14: 7
buckets 15, 16+:

With the above example configuration, the following are true:

The price of “john” would be 2 * 10^8, since “john” falls into bucket 4 and has no punctuation or numerics.
The price of “john1” would be 2 * 10^6, since “john1” falls into bucket 5 but has a number (and thus receives a 10x discount)
The price of “john_1” would be 2 * 10^6, since “john_1” falls into bucket 6 but has a number and punctuation (and thus receives a 10x discount)
The price of “j0hn_1” would be 2 * 10^5, since “j0hn_1” falls into bucket 6 but has a number and punctuation and lacks vowels (and thus receives a 100x discount)

NAME_IMPORT

Op: ;

Description: This transaction registers a name and some name state into a namespace that has been revealed, but not been launched. Only the namespace creator can import names. See the namespace creation section for details.

Example: c698ac4b4a61c90b2c93dababde867dea359f971e2efcf415c37c9a4d9c4f312

OP_RETURN wire format:

    0    2  3                             39
    |----|--|-----------------------------|
    magic op   name.ns_id (37 bytes)

Inputs:

The namespace reveal scriptSig (with the namespace revealer’s public key), or one of its first 300 extended public keys
Any payment inputs

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
recipient scriptPubKey
zone file hash (using the 20-byte hash in a standard p2pkh script)
payment change scriptPubKey

Notes:

These transactions can only be sent between the NAMESPACE_REVEAL and NAMESPACE_READY.
The first NAME_IMPORT transaction must have a scriptSig input that matches the NAMESPACE_REVEAL’s second output (i.e. the reveal output).
Any subsequent NAME_IMPORT transactions may have a scriptSig input whose public key is one of the first 300 extended public keys from the NAMESPACE_REVEAL’s scriptSig public key.

NAMESPACE_READY

Op: !

Description: This transaction launches a namesapce. Only the namespace creator can send this transaction. Once sent, anyone can register names in the namespace.

Example: 2bf9a97e3081886f96c4def36d99a677059fafdbd6bdb6d626c0608a1e286032

OP_RETURN wire format:


   0     2  3  4           23
   |-----|--|--|------------|
   magic op  .  ns_id

Inputs:

Namespace revealer’s scriptSigs

Outputs:

OP_RETURN payload
Change output to the namespace revealer’s p2pkh script

Notes:

This transaction must be sent within 1 year of the corresponding NAMESPACE_REVEAL to be accepted.

Method Glossary

Some hashing primitives are used to construct the wire-format representation of each name operation. They are enumerated here:

B40_REGEX = '^[a-z0-9\-_.+]*$'

def is_b40(s):
    return isinstance(s, str) and re.match(B40_REGEX, s) is not None

def b40_to_bin(s):
    if not is_b40(s):
        raise ValueError('{} must only contain characters in the b40 char set'.format(s))
    return unhexlify(charset_to_hex(s, B40_CHARS))

def hexpad(x):
    return ('0' * (len(x) % 2)) + x

def charset_to_hex(s, original_charset):
    return hexpad(change_charset(s, original_charset, B16_CHARS))

def bin_hash160(s, hex_format=False):
    """ s is in hex or binary format
    """
    if hex_format and is_hex(s):
        s = unhexlify(s)
    return hashlib.new('ripemd160', bin_sha256(s)).digest()

def hex_hash160(s, hex_format=False):
    """ s is in hex or binary format
    """
    if hex_format and is_hex(s):
        s = unhexlify(s)
    return hexlify(bin_hash160(s))

def hash_name(name, script_pubkey, register_addr=None):
    """
    Generate the hash over a name and hex-string script pubkey.
    Returns the hex-encoded string RIPEMD160(SHA256(x)), where
    x is the byte string composed of the concatenation of the
    binary
    """
    bin_name = b40_to_bin(name)
    name_and_pubkey = bin_name + unhexlify(script_pubkey)

    if register_addr is not None:
        name_and_pubkey += str(register_addr)

    # make hex-encoded hash
    return hex_hash160(name_and_pubkey)

def hash128(data):
    """
    Hash a string of data by taking its 256-bit sha256 and truncating it to the
    first 16 bytes
    """
    return hexlify(bin_sha256(data)[0:16])

Overview

Tutorials & Cookbooks

How to use BNS

Atlas

Reference

Bitcoin wire format

Transaction format

Payload Format

NAME_PREORDER

NAME_REGISTRATION

NAME_RENEWAL

NAME_UPDATE

NAME_TRANSFER

NAME_REVOKE

ANNOUNCE

NAMESPACE_PREORDER

NAMESPACE_REVEAL

NAME_IMPORT

NAMESPACE_READY

Method Glossary