Yesterday, Ethereum developers attended the 183rd ACDE meeting to review the Dencun upgrade and discuss proposed improvements for the upcoming Pectra upgrade. Regarding the Dencun upgrade, host Tim Beiko stated that it went smoothly and although there was a slight increase in reorgs, it has not had any impact so far and will continue to be monitored.
Yesterday, Ethereum core developers participated in the 183rd All Core Developers Execution (ACDE) conference call. The host of the meeting, Tim Beiko, summarized the event. During the meeting, developers reviewed the Dencun upgrade, which went live on the mainnet on the 13th, and discussed potential improvements for the next major Ethereum upgrade, Pectra.
The Dencun upgrade went very smoothly, and the reorg issue will continue to be monitored. Tim Beiko mentioned that the participation rate briefly dropped from around 99% to 95% during the fork, but quickly recovered after the fork. This may have been due to operators forgetting to upgrade. Prysm developer Terence Tsao shared that the network’s processing speed for new transactions and blobs is faster than expected and has not slowed down the Ethereum network as previously feared. However, he noticed a slight increase in the number of reorgs per day on his node, from an average of 13-14 before the upgrade to 17-18. Reorgs occur when a blockchain discards one or more blocks and replaces them with newly discovered blocks. Tim Beiko stated that this is a normal part of the blockchain network’s operation.
Tim Beiko also reminded that with the completion of Dencun, the Goerli testnet will officially be shut down next month.
The discussion then moved on to the next major Ethereum upgrade, Pectra, which encompasses the Prague and Electra upgrades. Developers are considering several new proposals (EIPs – Ethereum Improvement Proposals) for this upgrade, including:
EIP 2537: This proposal aims to provide Ethereum with a super toolbox that allows developers to create more secure and faster decentralized applications (dapps). Specifically, it introduces nine new precompiled instructions that are built directly into the Ethereum runtime environment, rather than being implemented through smart contracts. This proposal has been included in the scope of the Pectra upgrade, and the author of the proposal, Alex Stokes, suggested adding compression and decompression of points as input, which could be useful for L2 and other data-constrained users.
EIP 3074: This proposal focuses on enhancing the flexibility and programmability of user accounts, similar to implementing interactive experiences for smart contract wallets. In simple terms, it allows regular user accounts (external owned accounts, EOA) to authorize transactions through smart contracts. It is like adding a smart assistant to your wallet, which can help you manage transactions and even transfer control to a more secure place, reducing the risk of theft.
EIP 7547: This proposal introduces the concept of inclusion lists to control and manage the development of MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) infrastructure in the coming years. It is like adding a filter to Ethereum to ensure a fairer and more efficient processing of transactions.
EIP 7623: By increasing the cost of calldata, this proposal aims to reduce the maximum block size on the Ethereum mainnet. The purpose of this proposal is to encourage the use of the new storage method, blobs, introduced by the Dencun upgrade, as it is more cost-effective than the existing method. It is like telling everyone, “If you don’t need that much space to store data, don’t use that much. Use a more economical way!”
EIP 7645: Lastly, this proposal suggests renaming the ORIGIN opcode to SENDER to address developers’ misuse of this opcode.
The 183rd ACDE meeting not only provided a successful review of the Dencun upgrade but also discussed potential improvements for the future Pectra upgrade, demonstrating the Ethereum community’s commitment to continuous innovation and network optimization.