<p>As in every open-source project, the answer to &quot;Why isn't feature X implemented?&quot; is simply that nobody has added it. Maybe whoever worked on it didn't consider the option, maybe they found it too much work, or maybe they didn't think it'd be valuable.</p>
<p>Even though the feature may appear obvious or even trivial to you as a user, it still requires developer and reviewer time to add it. Unless you pay someone to do it for you, you're not entitled to other people's time.</p>
<p>Pull requests welcome, of course.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-09-01T21:14:06.107Z
2023-09-01T21:20:22.833Z
2023-09-01T21:20:22.833Z
Pieter Wuille
<p>Stemming from <a href="https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/113846/how-can-a-private-key-be-imported-to-a-descriptor-wallet#comment136395_113853">How can a private key be imported to a descriptor wallet? (comment)</a>, can't really understand how timestamp is a mandatory argument.</p>
<p>Every elements in a descriptor have an activation date. Like public keys from genesis and witness from segwit ca. 2016/2017. Propagating those up the descriptor format/lang, this causes the descriptor as a whole have a minimum sensible timestamp.</p>
<p>The current source code just seems to add unnecessary usage complexity, like... in cases when the user doesn't know what's the useful timestamp for some descriptor, they are forced to choose (potentially wrongly) an arbitrary date instead of letting the source code make an informed guess based on analyzing descriptor elements to infer a minimum reasonable guess, or analyze everything anyway as a most naive solution.</p>
<p>I know this reasoning isn't entirely valid because one can add arbitrary data before softfork activation, but even so, let's consider a reasonable timestamp is genesis for any possible descriptor.</p>
<p>How does this not make sense, for timestamp is mandatory in importdescriptors?</p>

<bitcoin-core><wallet><output-script-descriptors><wallet-import>
Why timestamp mandatory on importdescriptors?
Mercedes
# Why timestamp mandatory on importdescriptors?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2023-09-01)

Stemming from [How can a private key be imported to a descriptor wallet? (comment)](https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/113846/how-can-a-private-key-be-imported-to-a-descriptor-wallet#comment136395_113853), can't really understand how timestamp is a mandatory argument.

Every elements in a descriptor have an activation date. Like public keys from genesis and witness from segwit ca. 2016/2017. Propagating those up the descriptor format/lang, this causes the descriptor as a whole have a minimum sensible timestamp.

The current source code just seems to add unnecessary usage complexity, like... in cases when the user doesn't know what's the useful timestamp for some descriptor, they are forced to choose (potentially wrongly) an arbitrary date instead of letting the source code make an informed guess based on analyzing descriptor elements to infer a minimum reasonable guess, or analyze everything anyway as a most naive solution.

I know this reasoning isn't entirely valid because one can add arbitrary data before softfork activation, but even so, let's consider a reasonable timestamp is genesis for any possible descriptor.

How does this not make sense, for timestamp is mandatory in importdescriptors?

**Tags:** bitcoin-core, wallet, output-script-descriptors, wallet-import


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2023-09-01. Score: 1 | Accepted answer

As in every open-source project, the answer to "Why isn't feature X implemented?" is simply that nobody has added it. Maybe whoever worked on it didn't consider the option, maybe they found it too much work, or maybe they didn't think it'd be valuable.

Even though the feature may appear obvious or even trivial to you as a user, it still requires developer and reviewer time to add it. Unless you pay someone to do it for you, you're not entitled to other people's time.

Pull requests welcome, of course.


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