Witnesses

Witnesses are the elected block producers of SBChain. They are responsible for collecting transactions, producing blocks, signing blocks, and publishing price feeds for SbAssets.

Registration

Any account can register as a witness candidate.

Required fields for registration:

• witness_account: the account that owns and controls this witness
• url: public URL for the witness's information page
• block_signing_key: the public key used to sign blocks (separate from the account's active key)

Block Production

• The active witness set rotates through a deterministic production schedule
• Each witness produces exactly one block per round when it is their turn
• A missed slot is skipped; no other witness fills in, the block time advances
• Missed blocks are tracked in the witness object's participation record
• Witnesses with poor participation scores are more likely to lose votes and fall out of the active set

Block Reward

• witness_pay_per_block is paid per block produced (default: 10 SBT)
• Pay is placed into a vesting balance and vests over witness_pay_vesting_seconds (default: 86400s / 1 day)
• A missed block earns no pay
• Pay rate and vesting period are governance parameters adjustable by the committee

Price Feed Publishing

Active witnesses are the default feed producers for witness-fed SbAssets (witness_fed_asset flag).

• asset_publish_feed_operation is used to submit price feeds
• The protocol takes the median of all valid, non-expired feeds
• Witnesses that consistently fail to publish feeds risk losing votes

Protocol Constants