Ethereum’s new Altair update is being rolled out. It will allow the entire network to be migrated to ETH 2.0, and eventually replace the ETH mining system with a 100% proof-of-stake system. This is the first step in a larger movement called Beacon Upgrade.
- New ETH update brings us closer to ETH 2.0, scheduled for early 2022
- This update brings major technical changes
- Meanwhile, altcoins are fighting to take Ethereum’s place
Ethereum moves towards ETH 2.0
So far, 98.7% of the nodes in the network have accepted the update. Preston Vanloon, a lead developer of ETH 2.0, tweeted on Wednesday that the deployment was successful.
Indeed, this is a major step forward. It will make a lot of changes, like fixing some errors, as well as increasing “punishments” for nodes that are offline and do not play their role in securing transactions.
Paul Hauner, one of the main developers of this update, spoke to Cointelegraph to explain how Altair brought us closer to ETH 2.0:
“Altair has introduced two main changes. First, it added support for “light” clients, which are low-resource nodes that follow the chain with less functionality and slightly weaker security systems. Imagine a “light” node on your phone or in your browser. Second, it increased the penalties for going offline. These penalties were set low from the start, so as not to penalize users who are just learning the ropes. The merger will further increase these penalties. Apart from these two main changes, there was a handful of efficiency and storage updates.”
Also, the Altair update was a hard fork. Thus, the validators, the nodes that did not accept the update, will be gradually taken offline and cut off from the network. Each node needs 32 staked ETH to be operable. If they haven’t updated, their staked ETH count will gradually decrease, by 10% per year. A slow, but significant pace.
“I believe full ejection would happen once they went below 16 ETH, which would take quite a long time since the network is still being finalized,” said Coleman, another ETH developer.
No more offline ETH Nodes!
However, latecomers will still have the option to upgrade and then resume their role within the Ethereum ecosystem. In addition, this ETH will not be lost. They will simply be disconnected from the PoS staking system. Finally, the update does not take more than 10 minutes. So there is no reason not to follow suit!
“The protocol sees no difference between a validator that has not been updated and a validator that is just temporarily offline due to a power or network issue. Validators who haven’t updated simply need to do so and restart their nodes. They will start validating again once their node catches up with the Altair chain,” says Hauner.
The Ethereum developer team has been working for many months to implement the ETH 2.0 system. The latter should solve the many problems that have plagued the ETH ecosystem for a long time. With the explosion of NFTs, DeFi and the many applications developed on ETH, the network has become unusable. Fees are exploding, transaction times are getting longer.
Also read: “The Madness Continues: $17 Million in Bitcoin Found!”
ETH Killers attack
Faced with much criticism, this migration is progressing slowly. In the meantime, many projects try to focus on a specific point or on a particular problem. Songbird, the Canary Network (test project) of Flare Network, is trying to offer smart contracts. Fantom FTM has developed a solution to bridge Ethereum NFTs and transfer them at no cost. In short, the Ethereum Killers are carving out a place for themselves with the sole argument of doing the same work as Vitalik Buterin, but at a lower cost.
Behind these enticing offers hides another reality. If the Ethereum network is experiencing such problems today, it is because it has reached a critical size. And none of its competitors can boast of having come close to a tenth of it. Problems of size and scalability only happen once you are really big. And today, Ethereum is really big.