Good morning list,

Recently, somebody on the IRC channel, asked regarding smart contracts being 
transported via LN.

Indeed, this is theoretically possible, provided the "smart contract" is 
implementable as a Bitcoin SCRIPT.

Afterwards, I opined that, for transportation of *arbitrary* contracts, 
Poon-Dryja is superior to either Decker-Wattenhofer or Decker-Osuntokun-Russell.

So, first, my other opinions:

1.  The only smart contract you really want to transport is HTLC (or equivalent 
in scriptless script).  There really is no point in transporting any other 
contract on LN.  HTLCs can even be used to implement (nontransferable) swap 
options, and can be composed (at the cost of increasing CLTV limits on backoff) 
to create multi-step swaps.

2.  Decker-Osuntokun-Russell "eltoo" is far superior to Poon-Dryja "LN-penalty" 
in everything else, except transportation of *arbitrary* contracts.

Now, ultimately any Bitcoin SCRIPT may be expressed as a Boolean computation 
whether or not the contract has been fulfilled by the transaction that attempts 
to claim it.

So I introduce, an arbitrary contract C, ostensibly to be transported over LN.

And I introduce our transactions, as so: [scriptSig, redeemScript] -> redeeming 
transaction

To transport C over a channel between nodes A and B, under Poon-Dryja, we first 
have a channel anchoring transaction onchain:

[/*arbitrary*/, A && B] ->

Now suppose the entire output is to be put into a contract C. Under Poon-Dryja, 
we create the below symmetrical series of transactions, with only the anchoring 
transaction existing onchain:

[/*arbitrary*/, A && B] -> [signA signB, (revoke) || (A && B && C)] -> [signA 
signB witnessCbyA, revoke || (A && CSV)] /* held by A */

[/*arbitrary*/, A && B] -> [signA signB, (revoke) || (A && B && C)] -> [signA 
signB witnessCbyB, revoke || (B && CSV)] /* held by B */

Where (revoke) is the revocation key, whose derivation requires both A and B, 
and whose half is kept secret by the A (resp. B) until they both agree to 
revoke the old state.

Of note is that the only additional condition added to C is (A && B), which 
makes sense since the contract is between nodes A and B (and which would be 
implicitly required by the funding transaction anyway).  The (revoke) || does 
not affect the enforcement of C if the revocation key is not yet revealed; once 
the revocation key is revealed, that revokes the entire sequence of 
transactions (which is why (revoke) || appears in both the second and third 
transactions above).  In particular, the CSV-encumberance does not affect 
claiming of C; it encumbers the claiming of the money, but does not interact 
with C itself.  Thus, any CLTV conditions in C will not be interefered with by 
the CSV-encumberance on the *next* transaction.

Note also that only signA and signB for the final transaction needs to be 
shared; the witnessC can presumably be fulfilled by each side themselves 
automatically.

On the other hand, under Decker-Osuntokun-Russell eltoo, the transaction series 
is:

[/*arbitrary*/, A && B] -> [signA signB, (CSV && A && B) || (CLTV && A && B)] 
-> [nSequence signA signB, C]

Now the above is massively simpler with no additional SCRIPT that needs to be 
written, around the transported contract C --- but the CSV in the second 
transaction, is now potentially interfering with the operation of the contract 
C, as the final transaction cannot be enforced onchain until the CSV has been 
satisfied.  This is in contrast with the Poon-Dryja case, where the contract C 
appears immediately on the second transaction in the sequence, and can be 
enforced, as soon as it appears onchain.

(In eltoo, the (CTLV && A && B) branch of the intermediate contract is the 
"update" path, and the CLTV required is always a past Unix Epoch time, so this 
CLTV cannot interfere with the contract C).

The above consideration, is why I suppose that, *for arbitrary contracts*, 
Poon-Dryja is superior.

Simply, the conclusion is that Decker-Osuntokun-Russell channels require a CSV 
that may interfere with the contract C if C is time-sensitive (i.e. has a CLTV 
or CSV itself), whereas Poon-Dryja requires CSV only for revocability, and the 
CSV cannot prevent the enforcement of time-sensitive C.

Indeed, as I pointed out, even when transporting HTLCs, 
Decker-Osuntokun-Russell will require consideration of the CSV on top of the 
CLTV-deltas imposed by intermediary nodes, with weights complicated by the fact 
that CLTV-deltas are summed together but the highest CSV is added to the CLTV 
total, which does not mix well with typical route-finding algorithms (most of 
which assume a simple summing of costs, which CLTV-deltas use but CSVs on 
Decker-Osuntokun-Russell do not since highest is used).

In almost all other ways, Poon-Dryja is inferior:

1.  Does not use nLockTime in a sufficiently clever way.
2.  Dangerous "toxic waste" (old revoked transactions) which (1) you should not 
recover from your backups and (2) you should not let your worst enemy find, 
because they can publish those onchain and make you LOSE MONEY.
3.  Symmetrical chains of transactions, different for both parties, instead of 
a single chain.

In addition, arbitrary contracts are not really particularly useful.  HTLCs 
seem to me an important building block for digital value transfers, and they 
(and their equivalents under scriptless) are sufficient for most practical 
transfers.  Thus, moving forward, Decker-Osuntokun-Russell remains a superior 
technology over Poon-Dryja.

Regards,
ZmnSCPxj
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