Blockchain development company Blockstream has come out with a new version of its Bitcoin (BTC) scalability software, c-lightning, a post on the company’s web blog make known on March 1.
C-lightning is an operation of the off-chain Bitcoin scalability solution, the Lightning Network (LN) that is written in the C programming language. Per the proclamation, this latest version, c-lightning 0.7, is the first major release in 8 months and brings performance developments, bug fixes, augmented privacy and new features, as well as upgraded documentation.
The main new feature is plugin supports, which give room for developers to extend the abilities of the software with plugins written in any programming language. The developers hope that this will add to the flexibility, extensibility and also the customizability of this LN implementation.
Last week, Blockstream co-founder and CEO Adam Back participated in the LN-based Lightning Torch Bitcoin relay. He then passed the Torch on to former PayPal COO and early Blockstream supporter, Reid Hoffman.
As reported in January, blockchain technology company Bitfury Group has released some new sets of new tools for merchants and developers in a bid to drive wider adoption of the LN.
Data provided by a BTC statistics website shows that the capacity of the Bitcoin Lightning Network has exceeded $2 million in December of last year.
Also in December, an R&D lab at crypto startup TenX put to test the use of its cross-blockchain interoperability protocol to exchange Ethereum’s (ETH) ERC20 protocol tokens for Bitcoin using the Lightning Network.
