Bitcoin Basics

Warning: This post has KaTeX enabled, so if you want to view the rendered math formulas, you’ll have to unfortunately enable JavaScript. Note: All elliptic curve images are made using $\LaTeX$ and TikZ. The source code is freely available at GitHub. What the hell is an Elliptic Curve? In this post, I’ll try to explain what an elliptic curve is, and why it’s so important in cryptography. If you ever used an end-to-end encrypted messaging app, or hold Bitcoin (or any other shitcoin, though I don’t recommend it), you’ve probably heard of elliptic curves....

Warning: This post has KaTeX enabled, so if you want to view the rendered math formulas, you’ll have to unfortunately enable JavaScript. While attending the 2023 edition of TabConf, hosted in Atlanta, USA, from Sep 6th to Sep 9th, I also attended Base58’s intensive course on Taproot and Schnorr signatures. The course took place in the two days before the conference, on Sep 4th and Sep 5th. Here is a very broad overview based on my notes, a bunch of readings and some of my own research....