Allow only a single -usewallet argument #10867

1. 
   jonasschnelli commented at 3:59 PM on July 18, 2017: contributor

   Currently, one can specify multiple -usewallet arguments in bitcoin-cli (Including bitcoin.conf) where the last passed-in -usewallet will be used. This can result in executing critical actions on the wrong wallet.

   This PR halts bitcoin-cli if multiple -usewallet-arguments where passed-in.

   Tagged for 0.15 (in case we consider this a bug-fix).

   Reported by @morcos (https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/10849#issuecomment-316065717)

2. Allow only a single -usewallet argument 23d3789f6f
3. jonasschnelli added this to the milestone 0.15.0 on Jul 18, 2017
4. jonasschnelli added the label Wallet on Jul 18, 2017
5. 
   jnewbery commented at 1:46 PM on July 19, 2017: member

   You talk in #10868 about having a default wallet specified in .conf by using -usewallet. I think this PR would mean that if you did have a -usewallet in .conf, then you'd never be able to issue commands to any of the other wallets (since trying to specify a -usewallet override on the command line would trigger your "Only one -usewallet arguments is allowed" throw). Is that the intention?

6. 
   jonasschnelli commented at 1:51 PM on July 19, 2017: contributor

   You talk in #10868 about having a default wallet specified in .conf by using -usewallet. I think this PR would mean that if you did have a -usewallet in .conf, then you'd never be able to issue commands to any of the other wallets (since trying to specify a -usewallet override on the command line would trigger your "Only one -usewallet arguments is allowed" throw). Is that the intention?

   Yes. I think that would make sense. If a user defines a default wallet via explicitly place a -usewallet in bitcoin.conf, then rejecting an override via "Only one -usewallet arguments is allowed" seems reasonable. IMO this would be the right level of encourage / discourage to use a default wallet (allow it if you always want to use it, disallow it if you want to mix usage between specifying a wallet and having a default wallet).

7. 
   jnewbery commented at 1:55 PM on July 19, 2017: member

   In that case, I don't think this is a useful change. It would mean that users would be able to load a wallet and then not do anything with it. I think it'd be a really frustrating experience to see a wallet loaded by bitcoin, but the only way to access it is to stop the server, change the .conf file and then restart.

8. 
   jonasschnelli commented at 2:01 PM on July 19, 2017: contributor

   In that case, I don't think this is a useful change. It would mean that users would be able to load a wallet and then not do anything with it. I think it'd be a really frustrating experience to see a wallet loaded by bitcoin, but the only way to access it is to stop the server, change the .conf file and then restart.

   Not sure if I am wrong, but...

   1. The wallet does also something if you can't access it via bitcoin-cli, a) it syncs, b) you can access it with other tools (RPC, maybe later Qt).
   2. If you have decided to use a default wallet via -usewallet in your conf, and then want to access other wallets with bitcoin-cli, then just remove -usewallet from the conf (no need to restart the server). This seems to be the right level of encourage/discourage for the using a default wallet.
9. 
   jnewbery commented at 2:31 PM on July 19, 2017: member

   Yes, you're right. You can do this by changing .conf without restarting bitcoind, although I think that generally people shouldn't do that. Having inconsistent .conf/running config can be confusing.

10. 
    morcos commented at 3:39 PM on July 19, 2017: member

    Prefer #10868

11. 
    jonasschnelli commented at 7:50 PM on July 19, 2017: contributor

    Closing. Either we do that globally or not.

12. jonasschnelli closed this on Jul 19, 2017

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13. DrahtBot locked this on Sep 8, 2021

Milestone
0.15.0