How do I find out what version Protocol specification is describing?
3 Answers
As of october 2013, the protocol version is 70001. It's not linked anymore to client versions (so it doesn't correspond to version 0.7.0.1 in particular; 70001 was introduced in 0.8.0), and is intended to go up in increments of one, as changes specified in BIPs are implemented.
answered Oct 1, 2013 at 19:26
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1Thanks! How do you find this out? Is there a reason why it is not stated on the Protocol specification?– DanOct 1, 2013 at 19:35
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1Updating the specification on the wiki, and adding the protocol version in which every field was introduced would be an interesting project :) Oct 1, 2013 at 22:22
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All it needs is a sentence right at the top of the wiki page saying: 'The current protocol version is 70001.' Ideally it would also have a short description of the changes. I would update the wiki myself if I was allowed to edit it. Also where did you check to see what the current protocol version is and when it was updated?– DanOct 1, 2013 at 23:31
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2"current" protocol version... it's a bit more complex than that. Two clients negotiate which version to use when they connect; a few dozen versions numbers exist. It's not very useful to know what the latest protocol is without knowing what it entails. And I looked here: github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/v0.8.5/src/version.h#L28 Oct 1, 2013 at 23:44
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1Thanks for the help. I assumed the [en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Protocol_specification](Protocol specification) wiki page was designed to tell you what the protocol entails.– DanOct 2, 2013 at 12:29
There's now a good overview at https://bitcoin.org/en/developer-reference#protocol-versions. The latest as of March 2014 is 70002.
The latest protocol version can be found by looking at the latest canonical Bitcoin client implementation source code currently v0.8.5 at https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/v0.8.5/src/version.h#L28. This should tally with what is described at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Protocol_specification.