Post
Topic
Board Development & Technical Discussion
Re: Bravo Charlie One: Branding Bech32
by
DannyHamilton
on 26/12/2017, 10:32:24 UTC
I expect that in practical use, one of the great advantages of Bech32 addresses will be the relative ease of communicating them aloud—especially over the phone.
I don't expect this to work. Maybe if an experience phone operator is reading the address, as they're used to it, but I don't know many people who can use the International phonetic alphabet. People understand it, but can't reproduce it.

The beauty of a Bravo Charlie address is that (as compared to a traditional Bitcoin address) it is much less error prone, easier to find and fix mistakes, and is easier and faster to communicate aloud even when NOT using a phoenetic "radio alphabet".

And accuracy is a problem: the person reading it can make a mistake, and the person typing it can make a mistake.

Thankfully, a Bravo Charlie address will make it easier to find the mistake and easier to correct it.

When I read and type a Bitcoin address or private key, I make at least one mistake in every 3 keys I enter.

Yes, traditional Bitcoin addresses are quite error prone and difficult to communicate.

On the phone, that would mean you have to read back the entire address again.

Perhaps.  But if you confirm after every 4 or 6 characters, then you'll find and fix your errors before you ever get to the end of the address.  Then if there is still an error that was overlooked, the error correction native to a Bravo Charlie address will make it even easier to find and fix.

I would go back to the conventional option: please text me your address.

There are situations where I don't want to give the recipient (or sender) my cell phone number.