Gossip

The gossip component is used in virtually all node software. It uses the libp2p library for establishing a peer to peer network. This network is used for handling all coordination among nodes, in particular:

• Peer discovery, using both mDNS (for local networks) and Kademlia (for globally distributed peers).
• GossipSub for gossiping notifications between nodes. This covers use cases like:
  • Broadcasting a transaction to the processor for inclusion in a block.
  • Processor providing newly produced blocks.
  • Notification of failed transactions.
  • Alert notifications about potential chain manipulation.
• A request/response system for more sophisticated communication. In particular, this is used for synchronizing nodes.