Develop a tool for validating a standard Bitcoin address. This tool should have a good command-line interface and a test suite.







- Goal
- Contents
- Summary
- Downloadable Assets
- How To Use The Tools
- Project Log







I developed:
- a tool for validating a Bitcoin address from a private key.
- an accompanying test suite.

The tool has a useful command-line interface.

Please see the Downloadable Assets section for the tool and the test suite, and the How To Use The Tools section for instructions and examples.















Assets of this article:

List:



Asset: A tool that validates a Bitcoin address from a private key. Python 2.7.12.
validate_address.py

Asset: A test suite for the validation tool. Python 2.7.12, Pytest 4.6.11.
test_validate_address.py




Assets of other articles:

List:



Asset: A library of functions for handling standard Bitcoin data types. Python 2.7.
bitcoin_functions_2.py [paywalled]

Asset: An implementation of RIPEMD-160, written by Björn Edström. Python 2.7.
bjorn_edstrom_ripemd160.py [paywalled]

Asset: A Python implementation of ECDSA cryptography, written by Peter Pearson. Python 2.7.
ecdsa-0.10.tar.gz [paywalled]

Asset: A Python implementation of SHA256. Author unknown. Python 2.7.
pypy_sha256.py [paywalled]




Dependency tree:















Help:





Main:



Note: By default, the tool looks for a file named 'address.txt' in its local directory, so in the above command the filepath argument is optional.





Test:



Note: The test suite file needs to be in the same directory as the tool file.



Examples:

























This project is going to be very similar to Generating a standard Bitcoin address #2.

My working definition of a standard Bitcoin address:
- An uncompressed single-signature Pay-To-Public-Key-Hash (P2PKH) address.

Standard addresses start with the character '1'.

Example standard Bitcoin address (34 characters):


Work machine:
- Name: Judgement
- Windows 10
- Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL): Ubuntu 16.04
- I'm working in the WSL Ubuntu terminal.

My Python version:


My Pytest version:


Create a project directory, called:
"validating_a_standard_bitcoin_address"

Relevant: In the previous project Generating a standard Bitcoin address, in the Notes / Discoveries section, there is a part named "Algorithm for generating a Bitcoin address".

Relevant: In the previous project Creating and signing a standard raw Bitcoin transaction, in the Notes / Discoveries section, there is a part named "Algorithm for deriving the public key hash from a standard Bitcoin address".

Browse to Edgecase Bitcoin Storage Toolset version 2 and download the following assets:

Dependency tree:


bitcoin_functions_2.py contains various functions that I'll use in this project.
- One in particular, base58check_to_hex, is very close to what I want for this project.

Create a new directory named "work" in the project directory. Move the downloaded assets into the work directory.

Unpack the zipped tape archive file ecdsa-0.10.tar.gz, by opening a terminal, changing directory to the work directory, and running the following command:


This unpacking produced a new directory named "ecdsa-0.10" in the work directory. The directory "ecdsa-0.10" contains a directory named "ecdsa". Copy the "ecdsa" directory into the work directory, using the following command:


Delete ecdsa-0.10 and ecdsa-0.10.tar.gz.

I'll use the data from the previous project Bitcoin address test set when writing tests.

List of things to validate:
- The address begins with a '1' character.
- The public key hash that it contains is 20 characters.
- The double-SHA256 checksum at the end is 4 characters.
- The checksum is correct.




[development work occurs here.]




I've written a tool for validating a bitcoin address, and an accompanying test suite:
- validate_address.py
- test_validate_address.py




Let's record some examples of using
validate_address.py













And some examples of testing the tool.












Good. That's the end of this project.