When RingCT is enabled, outputs from coinbase transactions
are created as a single output, and stored as RingCT output,
with a fake mask. Their amount is not hidden on the blockchain
itself, but they are then able to be used as fake inputs in
a RingCT ring. Since the output amounts are hidden, their
"dustiness" is not an obstacle anymore to mixing, and this
makes the coinbase transactions a lot smaller, as well as
helping the TXO set to grow more slowly.
Also add a new "Null" type of rct signature, which decreases
the size required when no signatures are to be stored, as
in a coinbase tx.
The mixRing (output keys and commitments) and II fields (key images)
can be reconstructed from vin data.
This saves some modest amount of space in the tx.
It may be suboptimal, but it's a pain to have to rebuild everything
when some of this changes.
Also, no clue why there seems to be two different code paths for
serializing a tx...
kenshi84
Miguel Herranz
Shen Noether
moneromooo-monero
Riccardo Spagni
Antonio Juarez