Thinking about this a bit, I support this proposal for a BIP. This is not Bitcoin, but address types are bound to meet in meat-space and it would be good to have a central place where this is defined.
I would very much appreciate someone that worked on BIP32/BIP43 itself to comment on the details. Quoting bip 43; "We encourage different schemes to apply for assigning a separate BIP number and use the same number for purpose field, so addresses won't be generated from overlapping BIP32 spaces." On Wednesday, 12 April 2017 12:02:37 CEST Nick Johnson via bitcoin-dev wrote: > <pre> > BIP: bip-nickjohnson-ethereum-purpose > Layer: Applications > Title: Ethereum purpose allocation for Deterministic Wallets > Author: Nick Johnson <[email protected]> > Status: Proposed > Type: Standards Track > Created: 2017-04-12 > </pre> > > ==Abstract== > > This BIP defines a logical hierarchy for deterministic wallets on the > Ethereum blockchain based on an algorithm described in BIP-0032 (BIP32 > from now on) and purpose scheme described in BIP-0043 (BIP43 from now > on). > > This BIP is a particular application of BIP43. > > ==Motivation== > > Because Ethereum is based on account balances rather than UTXO, the > hierarchy defined by BIP44 is poorly suited. As a result, several > competing derivation path strategies have sprung up for deterministic > wallets, resulting in inter-client incompatibility. This BIP seeks to > provide a path to standardise this in a fashion better suited to > Ethereum's unique requirements. > > ==Path levels== > > We define the following 2 levels in BIP32 path: > > <pre> > m / purpose' / subpurpose' / * > </pre> > > Apostrophe in the path indicates that BIP32 hardened derivation is used. > > Each level has a special meaning, described in the chapters below. > > ===Purpose=== > > Purpose is a constant set to the hardened value of the BIP number assigned > to this BIP (equivalently, the BIP number, bitwise ORed with 0x80000000) > following the BIP43 recommendation. > It indicates that the subtree of this node is used according to this > specification. > > Hardened derivation is used at this level. > > ===Subpurpose=== > Subpurpose is set to the EIP number specifying the remainder of the BIP32 > derivation path. This permits new Ethereum-focused applications of > deterministic wallets without needing to interface with the BIP process. > > Hardened derivation is used at this level. > > ==Reference== * [[bip-0032.mediawiki|BIP32 - Hierarchical Deterministic > Wallets]] * [[bip-0043.mediawiki|BIP43 - Purpose Field for Deterministic > Wallets]] -- Tom Zander Blog: https://zander.github.io Vlog: https://vimeo.com/channels/tomscryptochannel _______________________________________________ bitcoin-dev mailing list [email protected] https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev
