The Segwit2x bitcoin fork may have been officially disabled, but no less than 150 nodes running its code have stopped accepting transaction blocks.
Bitnodes data shows that 95 nodes are currently running 2x software and are blocked at block number 494,782. CoinDance, another network data site, reports that 154 nodes are running the "btc1" software at the time of going to press.
The situation is curious, given that the 2x range effort – advanced by a group of startups, miners and community supporters as a way to extend the transaction capacity of the bitcoin network – was effectively dissolved on 8 November. email sent to the project mailing list. Yet despite the abandonment, dozens of nodes continue to be exploited using the latest version of the btc1 software.
The break of day seems to stem from a problem in the code that was preventing miners from actually producing a block of more than 1 MB that would push the nodes using Segwit2x into its own chain. In the midst of increasing discussions about the project's Slack channel, developer Jeff Garzik has released a fix aimed at facilitating the creation of a larger transaction block (though in the absence of a single transaction). a solid mining support, it is unlikely that the network will advance).
And even though the Segwit2x range itself will not go forward, the development of today has revived some of the acrimony among those who supported the effort and those who opposed it vehemently.
A particular restraint point is the exact block number at which the range was supposed to activate.
Previous documents indicate that this block would have been 494,784, which leads critics to say that the developer Garzik made an "off-by-one" error and that the nodes considering drilling might have been caught in limbo. Garzik, in turn, argued that the code works as expected in the absence of significant hash power.
It also remains to be seen if some of the nodes in question see their software changed. Bitnodes' data suggests that a number of them reside on hosting services from companies like Amazon and Alibaba.
So unless this block greater than 1 MB arrives, the nodes that run the software will have to keep waiting.
Disclosure: CoinDesk is a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which helped to arrange the Segwit2x agreement.
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