argus/PROTOCOL.md

# BNS1 — a minimal Namecoin-style name protocol on Bitcoin Cash (chipnet prototype)

Names are anchored by **CashTokens name certificates** on the BCH chain; records travel in
**OP_RETURN** payloads; discovery uses a **beacon address** so a plain electrum
server is the only infrastructure a resolver needs. No fork, no sidechain.

## Roles of the three mechanisms

| Mechanism | Role |
|---|---|
| CashTokens certificate (immutable NFT) | *Ownership.* The certificate's commitment is the UTF-8 name. Whoever holds the certificate owns the name. Consensus guarantees nobody can mint an output of an existing category without spending it. |
| OP_RETURN payload | *Data.* `BNS1` prefix + JSON: the name's records (URL, inline HTML page, payment address). |
| Beacon dust output | *Discovery.* Every protocol tx pays 600 sat to the well-known beacon address, so `blockchain.address.get_history(beacon)` enumerates every registration/update ever made. |

**Beacon (chipnet):** `bchtest:qp8njaa9a3ahg7259s5qajnce526n0rttsq8qwx4jl`

## Transactions

**REG** — one tx that simultaneously:
1. Mints an immutable certificate, commitment = UTF-8 name (≤ 40 bytes). Its category
   (= token ID) becomes the name's permanent identity.
2. Carries `OP_RETURN "BNS1{...json...}"` with `{"o":"REG","n":<name>,"r":<records>}`.
3. Pays 600 sat to the beacon.

**UPD** — one tx that:
1. Spends (moves) the name's certificate back to the owner — this is the ownership proof.
   A vout carrying the name's category is only possible if a vin held it (consensus).
2. Carries `OP_RETURN "BNS1{...}"` with `{"o":"UPD","n":<name>,"r":<newRecords>}`.
3. Pays 600 sat to the beacon.

**REL** — one tx that:
1. Spends the name's certificate and does **not** recreate it (no output carries
   the category): the certificate is burned.
2. Carries `OP_RETURN "BNS1{...}"` with `{"o":"REL","n":<name>}`.
3. Pays 600 sat to the beacon.

The name returns to the pool. Specified in `PROTOCOL-ADDENDUM-release.md`.

Transferring a name = sending the certificate to a new owner (no beacon tx needed).
A certificate moved that way must be anchored by an `UPD` before it can be released.

## Records (JSON, keep total payload ≤ 200 bytes)

- `u` — https URL the name points to (gateway redirects)
- `h` — inline HTML: a tiny website stored fully on-chain
- `a` — cashaddr for payments (the "send to alice.bch" use case)
- `ip` — IPv4 of a server that answers for the .bch host directly (DNS answers
  this instead of the local gateway)
- `p` — upstream URL the local gateway reverse-proxies (address bar stays .bch)
- `s3` — `bucket/key` (single object) or `bucket/prefix/` (site root) stored on
  the Sia network, served by the gateway through a local s3d daemon
  (credentials in sia-s3.json, not on-chain). Storage is decentralized and
  encrypted; the retrieval door is the local daemon.
- `tls` — SHA-256 fingerprint (hex, over DER) of the name's TLS certificate.
  The chain replaces the CA: identity comes from the certificate holder publishing
  this record, encryption from ordinary TLS. Resolvers/extensions can pin it;
  the prototype's trust path is the BNS Local Root CA (see ca/) which signs
  per-name certs and is installed as a trust anchor by setup/install.ps1.

## Resolver rules (indexer-enforced)

**One message per transaction.** A transaction's message is the one output
that parses as a BNS payload with a known operation. If more than one output
does, the transaction carries **no** message. *(2026-10-04. Before, the last
one won — which let whoever assembles a transaction replace a message another
party had fixed in it. No transaction on chipnet carried more than one.)*

1. Fetch beacon history, sort by `(height, txid)`; unconfirmed last.
2. **Then reorder causally:** never index a transaction before one it spends
   from. Independent transactions keep the `txid` tiebreak. *(See "Ordering"
   below — this rule is load-bearing, added 2026-07-26.)*
3. `REG`: valid if the same tx mints a certificate whose commitment matches the name
   and the name is not yet taken. **First valid REG wins** — with one
   refinement since 2026-10-05: a `REG` may be the reveal of an earlier `CMT`
   (it carries the salt `s`), and for six blocks after a name's first valid
   `REG` one with an older commit takes the name instead. Optional on chipnet,
   required on mainnet. See `PROTOCOL-ADDENDUM-commit-reveal.md` §0. The certificate
   must be the **only token of its category**: the category is created by
   this transaction (it spends, at output index 0, the outpoint whose txid is
   the category), exactly one output carries it, and that output is an NFT
   with no capability and no fungible amount. Rule 4 accepts an update from
   any token of a name's category, so a registration that left a second one
   in existence would let its holder rewrite the name after selling the
   certificate; such a registration is void. *(Added 2026-10-04; every valid
   registration on chipnet already satisfied it.)* If the name was
   released (rule 5), the `REG` must be in a later block than the confirmed
   release — the one-block gap.
4. `UPD`: valid if some output of the tx carries the name's category.
   A name whose certificate is held by the registry covenant answers only to
   an `UPD` that states the covenant state (`c`) and whose claim matches the
   certificate's address; it stops resolving once its grace period has
   passed. See `PROTOCOL-ADDENDUM-covenant-names.md`. *(Chipnet, 2026-10-04.)*
5. `REL`: valid if the name is registered, no output of the tx carries the
   name's category, and one input spends an output of an earlier beacon
   transaction that carries the certificate. The name leaves the index.
6. Names: `[a-z0-9-]{1,32}`, rendered as `<name>.bch`.

### Ordering (why rule 2 exists)

`(height, txid)` alone is arbitrary within a block and within the mempool, and
that breaks the most ordinary sequence in the protocol: **register a name, then
immediately point it somewhere.** If the `UPD`'s txid happens to sort below its
own `REG`'s, the `UPD` is evaluated against an index that does not contain the
name yet, fails rule 4, and is silently dropped — *permanently*, if both land in
the same block, since the ordering never changes afterwards.

Observed on chipnet 2026-07-26: `REG ca243c06…` for `smtest-fbe8cd.p2p` and its
`UPD 8da2cc4a…` were both unconfirmed; `8da2…` sorted first, and the record
never appeared even though the update transaction was entirely valid.

The fix is a stable topological pass over the history: keep the `(height, txid)`
baseline, but hold back any transaction whose parents (within the beacon set)
have not been emitted yet. Cost is O(n²) over the beacon history, which is read
once per index build. Implemented identically in `src/lib/resolver-web.js` and
`src/lib/bns.js` — **the two must stay in lockstep**, since a disagreement
between them is a consensus split between clients.

## Blocklist (resolver-side)

Not a chain rule. A resolver may subscribe to lists of flagged names and warn
about, or refuse, a name a list flags; the name stays registered and any
resolver that does not subscribe resolves it as before. The messages (`RPT`,
`BLK`, `UBK`), the authority rule and the client behaviour are in
`PROTOCOL-ADDENDUM-blocklist.md`.

## Honest limitations (prototype vs production)

- Uniqueness is **indexer policy**, not consensus. Production: a covenant-run
  registry (CashScript) that consensus-enforces one certificate per name, or full
  BCMR-style client-side validation of the genesis chain.
- Intra-block ordering uses txid as tiebreak among *independent* transactions
  (electrum history has no tx index). Dependent transactions are ordered
  causally — see "Ordering" above.
- The beacon is a keyed address (prototype convenience); production would use a
  keyless constant script so no one can be pressured over it.
- No expiry/renewal: names live until their owner releases them (`REL`);
  an abandoned name still lives forever (Namecoin used ~8-month renewals to
  garbage-collect dead names — the covenant registry is that step).
- Front-running: a miner/mempool observer could see a REG and race it
  (Namecoin's two-step `name_new` commit-reveal solved this; omitted here).