Over the past 18 months, Optech has published the equivalent of about 350 printed pages worth of Bitcoin news and documentation. In an effort to make that material more accessible, we’re pleased to announce a new topics index with an initial set of 40 topics.

Main topics index page

We indexed our existing content in three different ways: by topic name (or alias), by each noteworthy event affecting the topic (in date order), and by categorizing topics based on what parts of the Bitcoin system they affect. Clicking the name of a topic or an event will bring you to the topic’s page with a brief description of the topic, a list of primary sources that best define the topic, a date-sorted list of mentions on the Optech website, and links to any additional resources about the topic that we think might be useful.

Example of a topic page: Taproot

We plan to make monthly updates to the topic index with links to any new information about each topic. As part of those updates, we also plan to add new topics at a modest rate of one new topic per week. This should bring us to about 100 indexed topics by the end of 2020.

Like almost everything on the Optech website, content in the topic index is freely licensed and we welcome contributions. Suggesting edits or reporting issues can be done using links provided at the bottom of each topic page. We also welcome suggestions for new topics to index, but note that because this is an index to the Optech website (and not a guide to the Bitcoin system in general), we currently have a policy that a topic should be mentioned in at least three separate Optech newsletters or blog posts before we create a topic page for it.

As always, we extend our most sincere thanks to the developers and other contributors actively working on the topics that we’ve had the pleasure of writing about. Without your dedication to improving the Bitcoin system, our work would be impossible and Bitcoin wouldn’t be nearly as wonderful as it is.