About DAG, it's kinda different tech. The DAG is about every client having its own chain, linked to the others. Mini-blockchain is about having a "snapshot" of the balances, instead of computing them from the full blockchain (or trusting someone to do it for you): this enables clients to start keeping the full blockchain from when they appeared on the network, or even later if they don't need full transaction data. Please see cryptonite.info for detailed description of the XCN custom tech over bitcoin base.
Great explanation, thanks!
From a UX perspective, what are the trade-offs (in terms of phone battery life, confirmations, etc.) of running an XCN client vs mining my personal Raiblock sidechain in order to buy a couple of pizzas or a cup of coffee?
Any idea or guesstimate where the tps top out, all else being equal (IE same number of users on the same mix of hardware)?
A real life test of tps on cryptonite hasn't been made yet, and it's very difficult to make an estimate. What we can say, though, is that xcn transactions are usually lighter than the classic bitcoin based coin, because xcn doesn't need a change address and, thus, needs one less output per tx, making it lighter. Max block size is dynamic, similar to cryptonote coins.