The decentralized commit problem, described in this blog is the fact that, while each transaction within a trust channel is atomic because the IOU is conditioned on the knowledge of a preimage, there is nothing that guarantees that each node in the route will share the preimage further up the chain all the way to the first reciever. More importantly, there is no way you can verify that a node recieved the preimage and refused to share it.
True, your counter part would need to show you the preimage to prove to you that your IOU to him now is valid and your credit has changed, but they can also either hoard the preimage, or receive it much later for one reason or another, way after you actually needed it.
Ripple originally recognized that, and suggested commit methods like a trusted registry or a blockchain where the preimage needs to be published for all the routes to see at once and use that publication as the IOU validity condition.
The decentralized commit problem, described in this blog is the fact that, while each transaction within a trust channel is atomic because the IOU is conditioned on the knowledge of a preimage, there is nothing that guarantees that each node in the route will share the preimage further up the chain all the way to the first reciever. More importantly, there is no way you can verify that a node recieved the preimage and refused to share it.
True, your counter part would need to show you the preimage to prove to you that your IOU to him now is valid and your credit has changed, but they can also either hoard the preimage, or receive it much later for one reason or another, way after you actually needed it.
Ripple originally recognized that, and suggested commit methods like a trusted registry or a blockchain where the preimage needs to be published for all the routes to see at once and use that publication as the IOU validity condition.
Does Offset engage with this issue at all?