blocks_iterator 0.5.0

Iterates Bitcoin blocks
Documentation

MIT license Crates

Blocks iterator

Iterates over Bitcoin blocks, decoding data inside Bitcoin Core's blocks directory.

Features:

  • Blocks are returned in height order, it avoids following reorgs (see max_reorg parameter)
  • Blocks come with metadata like all block's previous outputs, it allows computing transactions fee or verifying scripts in the blockchain.

Memory requirements and performance

Running iterate example on threadripper 1950X, Testnet @ 2090k, Mainnet @ 709k. Spinning disk.

Network --skip--prevout --max-reorg Memory Time
Mainnet false 6 8.3GB 1h:15m
Mainnet true 6 157MB 1h:00m
Testnet false 40 2.4GB 5m:12s
Testnet true 40 221MB 5m:12s

Examples

Run examples with:

cargo run --release --example iterate
  • iterate iterate over blocks and print block fee
  • heaviest find the transaction with greatest weight
  • most_output find the transaction with most output
  • verify verify transactions

Similar projects

  • bitcoin-iterate this project inspired blocks_iterator, the differences are:
    • bitcoin-iterate is C-based
    • bitcoin-iterate it's more suited for shell piping, while blocks_itearator is intended to use as a rust library
    • bitcoin-iterate doesn't give previous outputs information
    • bitcoin-iterate is making two passage over blocks*.dat while blocks_iterator is doing one pass keeping out-order-blocks in memory (the latter is faster at the expense of higher memory usage)
  • rust-bitcoin-indexer this project requires longer setup times (about 9 hours indexing) and a postgre database, once the indexing is finished it allows fast queries on relational database.
  • electrs specifically intended for the Electrum protocol