Explain the BIP148 soft-forked chain

We're very happy to announce that you can now explore the BIP148 soft-forked chain using our web-based block explorer at:

https://uasf-explorer.satoshiportal.com

This will allow you to confirm that transactions are getting confirmed in BIP148 blocks that are relayed to this node.

This is not a best practice, and you are trusting us. While I can guarantee that we will always leave this explorer on the BIP148 chain even if it gets abandonned, I cannot guarantee uptime or security.

Personal block explorers are a great utilty that every hardcore bitcoiner should consider setting up. In the past, the easiest way to do this was by implementing Bitcore, BitPay's javacript Bitcoin library and Bitcoin node framework. It came directly with a blockexplorer UI and API that was easy to deploy.

However, Bitpay has abandonned the Bitcore project for a while now. The problem is that all the code needed to get upgraded for Segwit, and nobody was doing the work.

After months of posting on the Bitcore forums and contacting directly former and current staff, including on several occasions the CEO Stephen Pair, it became clear it was not happening.

Ultimately, SatoshiLabs (which itself uses Bitcore for the trezor web wallet) did a PR with all the upgrades: https://github.com/bitpay/bitcoin/pull/43 - Bitpay is aware, they are just doing nothing.

It was never merged by Bitpay, so if you want to use it you need to use directly Satoshi Labs repo: https://github.com/satoshilabs/bitcore

So basically, this is a modified Satoshilabs fork of Bitcore block explorer which is run by me and connected to our UASF 1.0 Bitcoin node.

The server is run by Satohi Portal, with support of Bitcoin Embassy, out of Montreal, Canada.

EDIT: it is actually currently still UASF 0.3 but we will upgrade as soon as SatoshiLabs has upgraded their repo which by judging at their speed should be any day now.