Getrawtransaction does not work for genesis block coinbase transaction

[ThePiachu]

While testing a few things on testnet, I called

getrawtransaction("4a5e1e4baab89f3a32518a88c31bc87f618f76673e2cc77ab2127b7afdeda33b", 1)

(coinbase for block 0 on testnet3) and got a response of

{'message': 'No information available about transaction', 'code': -5}

Calling

getrawtransaction("f0315ffc38709d70ad5647e22048358dd3745f3ce3874223c80a7c92fab0c8ba", 1)

(coinbase for block 1 on testnet4) gives a response of

{'blockhash': '00000000b873e79784647a6c82962c70d228557d24a747ea4d1b8bbe878e1206', 'vout': [{'scriptPubKey': {'reqSigs': 1, 'hex': '21021aeaf2f8638a129a3156fbe7e5ef635226b0bafd495ff03afe2c843d7e3a4b51ac', 'addresses': ['n3GNqMveyvaPvUbH469vDRadqpJMPc84JA'], 'asm': '021aeaf2f8638a129a3156fbe7e5ef635226b0bafd495ff03afe2c843d7e3a4b51 OP_CHECKSIG', 'type': 'pubkey'}, 'value': 50.0, 'n': 0}], 'hex': '01000000010000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000ffffffff0e0420e7494d017f062f503253482fffffffff0100f2052a010000002321021aeaf2f8638a129a3156fbe7e5ef635226b0bafd495ff03afe2c843d7e3a4b51ac00000000', 'vin': [{'coinbase': '0420e7494d017f062f503253482f', 'sequence': 4294967295L}], 'txid': 'f0315ffc38709d70ad5647e22048358dd3745f3ce3874223c80a7c92fab0c8ba', 'blocktime': 1296688928, 'version': 1, 'confirmations': 147738, 'time': 1296688928, 'locktime': 0}

Which indicates that getrawtransaction has problems returning genesis block coinbase information. My bitcoind has been set up with -txindex=1 -reindex=1, so it should know all of the transactions.

[gmaxwell]

Works as designed: The genesis block coinbase transaction effectively doesn't exist, as it was never indexed in the original software. Making it spendable would be a hard-forking change, returning it with txindex=1 would suggest the coin supply was 50 BTC higher than it actually is since it hasn't been spent.

[ThePiachu]

Well, I am mainly going at it for the sake of completeness. I'm currently writing a block explorer application, I can access data about every transaction but this one. I could work around it if there was some "getrawblock" function I could call, but that is also missing, so I have to piece together blocks from raw transactions.

[luke-jr]

getblock(, 0)

But really, this "transaction" doesn't exist.

[luke-jr]

IMO, the bug is really that "4a5e1e4baab89f3a32518a88c31bc87f618f76673e2cc77ab2127b7afdeda33b" is listed in getblock at all.
We should just consider "4a5e1e4baab89f3a32518a88c31bc87f618f76673e2cc77ab2127b7afdeda33b" as a "no-transactions-at-all merkle root"

[ThePiachu]

I think getblock accepts only 1 parameter. I tried calling getblock(null, 0) or getblock("000000000933ea01ad0ee984209779baaec3ced90fa3f408719526f8d77f4943", 0) and I get {'message': 'getblock \nReturns details of a block with given block-hash.', 'code': -1} .

[luke-jr]

The second parameter was added after 0.8.

[ThePiachu]

You mean in the latest version that is not yet a standard download? I'm running 0.8.5-beta.

At any rate, thanks for the info, I will see what the newest update brings, it might make my problem obsolete.

[sumory]

@luke-jr @ThePiachu i also want to get all detail about a block, such as all the transactions included. but getblock is different between 0.7 and 0.8, so i use getrawtransaction, unfortunately, it does't work.

[gavinandresen]

I think we should have a special-case error message just for the genesis block coinbase transaction; maybe:

{'message': 'Genesis block coinbase transaction is not indexed-- yes, that is weird. No, we are not going to change that.', 'code': -5}

[laanwj]

@gavinandresen If we're going to special-case the genesis block in that RPC, we can just as well return the (known) value :p

[ZKVCRYPTO0022]

.........do not try, 50 btc per block ,,,,,,to reach 21mill!,,,,which block?

[h4x3rotab]

It’s not indexed and thus not included in the coin supply. Even satoshi can’t spend it

…

On Thu, Feb 21, 2019 at 7:00 PM ZKVCRYPTO0022 ***@***.***> wrote: .........do not try, 50 btc per block ,,,,,,to reach 21mill!,,,,which block? — You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#3303 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ABR_7uGyh3_GemEhiE-G2dMLPyUolQGqks5vPnw1gaJpZM4BPRKY> .

[ZKVCRYPTO0022]

Correct, and it will stay like that Dana četvrtak, 21. veljače 2019. h4x3rotab <notifications@github.com> piše:

…

It’s not indexed and thus not included in the coin supply. Even satoshi can’t spend it On Thu, Feb 21, 2019 at 7:00 PM ZKVCRYPTO0022 ***@***.***> wrote: > .........do not try, 50 btc per block ,,,,,,to reach 21mill!,,,,which > block? > > — > You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. > Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub > <#3303 (comment)>, > or mute the thread > <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ABR_7uGyh3_GemEhiE- G2dMLPyUolQGqks5vPnw1gaJpZM4BPRKY> > . > — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#3303 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AkJUqpoUHUZOOEnprqJjo7RqpOjLEXWDks5vPqmYgaJpZM4BPRKY> .