release-notes-0.20.1.md raw

0.20.1 Release Notes ====================

Bitcoin Core version 0.20.1 is now available from:

<https://bitcoincore.org/bin/bitcoin-core-0.20.1/>

This minor release includes various bug fixes and performance improvements, as well as updated translations.

Please report bugs using the issue tracker at GitHub:

<https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/issues>

To receive security and update notifications, please subscribe to:

<https://bitcoincore.org/en/list/announcements/join/>

How to Upgrade ==============

If you are running an older version, shut it down. Wait until it has completely shut down (which might take a few minutes in some cases), then run the installer (on Windows) or just copy over /Applications/Bitcoin-Qt (on Mac) or bitcoind/bitcoin-qt (on Linux).

Upgrading directly from a version of Bitcoin Core that has reached its EOL is possible, but it might take some time if the data directory needs to be migrated. Old wallet versions of Bitcoin Core are generally supported.

Compatibility ==============

Bitcoin Core is supported and extensively tested on operating systems using the Linux kernel, macOS 10.12+, and Windows 7 and newer. Bitcoin Core should also work on most other Unix-like systems but is not as frequently tested on them. It is not recommended to use Bitcoin Core on unsupported systems.

From Bitcoin Core 0.20.0 onwards, macOS versions earlier than 10.12 are no longer supported. Additionally, Bitcoin Core does not yet change appearance when macOS "dark mode" is activated.

Known Bugs ==========

The process for generating the source code release ("tarball") has changed in an effort to make it more complete, however, there are a few regressions in this release:

install autotools and run ./autogen.sh before you can run ./configure. This is the same as when checking out from git.

BITCOIN_GENBUILD_NO_GIT=1 make.

Notable changes ===============

Changes regarding misbehaving peers


Peers that misbehave (e.g. send us invalid blocks) are now referred to as discouraged nodes in log output, as they're not (and weren't) strictly banned: incoming connections are still allowed from them, but they're preferred for eviction.

Furthermore, a few additional changes are introduced to how discouraged addresses are treated:

(or the -bantime setting). Depending on traffic from other peers, discouragement may time out at an indeterminate time.

the listbanned RPC. That RPC also no longer reports the ban_reason field, as "manually added" is the only remaining option.

If you need to remove a discouragement, you can remove all discouragements by stop-starting your node.

Notification changes


-walletnotify notifications are now sent for wallet transactions that are removed from the mempool because they conflict with a new block. These notifications were sent previously before the v0.19 release, but had been broken since that release (bug #18325).

PSBT changes


PSBTs will contain both the non-witness utxo and the witness utxo for segwit inputs in order to restore compatibility with wallet software that are now requiring the full previous transaction for segwit inputs. The witness utxo is still provided to maintain compatibility with software which relied on its existence to determine whether an input was segwit.

0.20.1 change log =================

Mining

P2P protocol and network code

Wallet

RPC and other APIs

GUI

Build system

Tests and QA

Miscellaneous

Credits =======

Thanks to everyone who directly contributed to this release:

As well as to everyone that helped with translations on Transifex.