--- tags: newineth2 description: The latest update on Ethereum 2.0 development image: https://benjaminion.xyz/f/favicon-96x96.png --- <style> a {text-decoration: underline;} a {color: #0000ee;} a:visited {color: #551a8b;} .ui-infobar {visibility: hidden; padding-top: 0;} .community-button {visibility: hidden;} .markdown-body {padding-top: 0;} </style> # What's New in Eth2 - 10&nbsp;September&nbsp;2021 ![My avatar](https://benjaminion.xyz/f/ms-icon-144x144.png =32x32) Ben Edgington (Eth2 at [ConsenSys](https://consensys.net/) — all views expressed are my own) Edition 77 at [eth2.news](https://eth2.news/) ## Top picks It's [Gitcoin Grants](https://gitcoin.co/grants/) Round 11! Plenty to explore there, but if you want a quick and easy way to support projects building tools for solo stakers (and you really should), [Superphiz](https://twitter.com/superphiz/status/1435750803558567937) [has you covered](https://gitcoin.co/grants/explorer/?collection_id=12328). For more info on these, Ethstaker and Wagyu did a slot at the [GR11 Kickoff Event](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgXJpBmvar0&t=722s). ## The Beacon Chain The beacon chain quietly passed its two millionth slot earlier in the week. There are now over 230,000 active validators. The recent [minor incident](https://hackmd.io/@benjaminion/wnie2_210827#The-Beacon-Chain) has put the packing of attestations into blocks under more scrutiny. As the number of validators on the beacon chain has grown, so the number of committees operating at each slot has grown, leading to increased pressure on the limited block space for the inclusion of attestations. This seems to be resulting in a small but noticeable increase in the numbers of delayed and dropped attestations across the network. Where previously clients could get away with inefficient packing, it is now having a material impact. Mac Ladson of the Sigma Prime team wrote up a very thorough [explanation and analysis](https://lighthouse.sigmaprime.io/attestation-packing.html) of attestation packing throughout the beacon chain's history. In connection with this work, the Lighthouse team identified issues with a number of clients, including a propensity for Teku and others to sometimes include redundant attestations: that is, attestations that add no new information and just take up space that could be used by useful attestations. We are grateful to the Lighthouse team for their work on this, and have made a number of improvements to Teku as a result ([1](https://github.com/ConsenSys/teku/pull/4312), [2](https://github.com/ConsenSys/teku/pull/4313), [3](https://github.com/ConsenSys/teku/pull/4322)). ### Altair Altair is a planned upgrade to the beacon chain that optimises some accounting and introduces sync committees for light clients. The Altair upgrade of the Prater testnet took place on the 2nd of September and went ok, if not quite flawlessly. Among other slight bumps, Teku was unable to produce a valid block for the first epoch, but was fine thereafter. Adrian Sutton [analysed](https://hackmd.io/@ajsutton/rJmzlJyfY) the (rather subtle) reason, and the issue [is fixed](https://github.com/ConsenSys/teku/pull/4317) ready for the beacon chain Altair upgrade. Now that both Pyrmont and Prater testnets have been upgraded, one observation is that sync aggregate participation is lower than we would expect it to be: you can see it [here](https://prater.beaconcha.in/blocks) for Prater, currently at around 70%, while overall network participation is around 87%. As discussed on this week's devs call, we will likely delay the beacon chain Altair upgrade until this is better understood and the root cause identified - it's a new feature and nothing relies on it, but there is caution around things we cannot yet explain. Investigations are underway. Assuming that that issue can be dealt with, we will aim to set a beacon chain upgrade slot at the next call in two weeks, somewhere in mid-October. In other Prater testnet news, over the next few weeks there will be a [large increase](https://twitter.com/parithosh_j/status/1433711196671201349) in the number of validators. This is to ensure that Prater remains larger than the beacon chain mainnet to provide a proper test of clients. ### The Merge We're now getting well into the technical weeds on planning for The Merge. The main recent developments are, 1. Mikhail's consensus--execution engine [API design space](https://hackmd.io/@n0ble/consensus_api_design_space) specification. This is being worked through and agreed line-by-line across a series of meetings, including the All Core Devs call. It essentially specifies how the Eth1/execution client and the Eth2/consensus client will talk to each other. 2. Felix from the Geth team published a proposal for how [network sync](https://github.com/fjl/p2p-drafts/blob/master/merge-sync/merge-sync.md) could work post-Merge. This was also discussed at last week's [All Core Devs](#All-Core-Devs) meeting. Client teams (both [Eth1](https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-3675) and [Eth2](https://github.com/ethereum/consensus-specs/tree/dev/specs/merge)) are all now working on implementing the latest specs in preparation for devnets in October. Looking beyond The Merge to sharding, Proto has proposed an extension to SSZ to allow it to [embed KZG commitments](https://github.com/ethereum/consensus-specs/pull/2585) and other commitment types useful beyond simple Merkle roots. ## Staking **Huge news:** Rocket Pool finally [announced](https://twitter.com/Rocket_Pool/status/1435819967979552768) their mainnet launch date :tada: Drumroll... Rocket Pool will be live on October 6th! The launch is staged across [four phases](https://medium.com/rocket-pool/rocket-pool-staking-protocol-part-4-2635c44e4f7e) to limit risk. The Ethereum on ARM team has some experience of running a validator on a [Raspberry Pi](https://twitter.com/EthereumOnARM/status/1432251814402002948). Lots of terrific advice there. Good stuff from the Nimbus team on [The importance of client diversity in the run up to the merge](https://our.status.im/the-importance-of-client-diversity/): > Whether you are an exchange, a staking provider, or an individual staker, if you care about the future of Ethereum, then it is your duty, at this stage, to facilitate and promote the use of minority clients. Superphiz rightly [points the finger](https://twitter.com/superphiz/status/1434851281240301577) at staking providers for not taking responsibility over this issue. By running a near monoculture they are hurting themselves and hurting the network. (Alpha-leak: there are [more profitable](https://consensys.net/blog/codefi/the-state-of-staking-in-august-2021/) clients out there than the current majority client.) I was [very alarmed](https://twitter.com/benjaminion_xyz/status/1430944105958416385) to read that part of Lido operator Chorus One's [plan](https://blog.lido.fi/lido-20-08-2021-orphaned-blocks-in-ethereum-incident-postmortem/amp/) in response to the recent incident was to "diversify" by adding *more Prysm* into the mix. Sorry, guys, under the present circumstances, that's going to do more harm than good. ## Tooling Adrian Sutton created an extensible [Validator Monitor](https://github.com/ajsutton/validator-monitor) that runs alongside a node and uses the standard API to check whether weird (but non-fatal) things are happening on-chain, such as redundant attestations in blocks. Primarily useful to devs wanting to keep an eye on things. The [Deplorable Renaming](https://notes.ethereum.org/@timbeiko/great-renaming) aimed at expunging all mention of Eth2 is now complete. Entirely predictably, this ill-advised exercise broke at least one client team's CI pipeline, causing some temporary havoc. ## The Great Explainers I am becoming a big fan of [u/Liberosist](https://www.reddit.com/user/Liberosist/) on Reddit. Here are a couple of recent posts that caught my attention: [A Vision of Ethereum (2025)](https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/pgcacb/a_vision_of_ethereum_2025/), and [Why rollups + data shards are the only sustainable solution for high scalability](https://www.reddit.com/r/ethfinance/comments/pk57n7/why_rollups_data_shards_are_the_only_sustainable/). Both of these are excellent, and well worth your time. A couple of blog posts are due on the incredible work my ConsenSys colleagues did to formally verify the beacon chain specification. Franck has now published the first, [How We Proved the Eth2 Deposit Contract Is Free of Runtime Errors](https://consensys.net/blog/ethereum-2-0/20039/). It includes some gentle background on how formal verification works. Tim Beiko's [AllCoreDevs Update 006](https://tim.mirror.xyz/CHQtTJb1NDxCK41JpULL-zAJe7YOtw-m4UDw6KDju6c) gives a nice overview of the history of how we ended up at The Merge and what the roadmap looks like now. I covered some more of this ground in a [PeepAnEip](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlFKZR_ofSo) session and [ZeroKnowledge podcast](https://zeroknowledge.fm/187-2/). In [Secured no. 1](https://blog.ethereum.org/2021/09/09/secured-no-1/), a new blog from the Ethereum Foundation, Antonio Sanso explores some of the issues that have arisen in connection with the BLS12-381 elliptic curve that we are using for signing by validators. There have been some interesting gotchas, from the specification onwards. Caspar, also from the Ethereum Foundation, has put together a nice concise [Eth2 resources list](https://notes.ethereum.org/@casparschwa/HyGvlvkfK). My own eth2.info is woefully neglected; however, I have a secret plan on that front :sunglasses: Sadly, I didn't get to any of EDCON. But here are some Eth2 talks that came to my attention: - Alex Stokes on [Light Client Design in Eth2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysW-Bq05pJQ&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=36). Slides [here](https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1mijb4QxOoy8KFDw2HrLxFFXXli9L19IJdEYQ9rHyAP8/edit#slide=id.p). - Danny Ryan on [Ethereum isn’t Done](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SPMJeZyQ2Y&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=6). Slides [here](https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Br5NOT2F9LFcVLBHI3uZrCIc7d6HCQl2iCHvbAE_sIQ/edit#slide=id.p). NFT sale [here](https://opensea.io/collection/when-merge). - Hsiao Wei with [Beacon Chain Validator FAQs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fhva33w9-YE&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=5) - Chen siming and [Visual Analytics for ETH2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVoY8eNDpXc&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=1) - Vitalik on [Single Slot Finality](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPgUKNPWXNI&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=19) - Tim Beiko, [An Overview of the Ethereum Roadmap](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfrtO0JeQhs&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz&index=26) The full set of talks is [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVoY8eNDpXc&list=PL6-IF807eaBFg6Rg22ByDsVXUg1wfaWRz) (not that easy to find!). ## Research Now that Ethereum 2.0 is not so much a single event, but more a long-term series of upgrades, it's appropriate occasionally to look more broadly than the usual proof of stake and sharding stuff. In that spirit, consider Verkle trees. [Vitalik](https://vitalik.ca/general/2021/06/18/verkle.html) and [Dankrad](https://dankradfeist.de/ethereum/2021/06/18/verkle-trie-for-eth1.html) did explainers back in June. And here are some of the latest developments: - Peep an EIP session with Dankrad this week on [Verkle tries for Ethereum state](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGJOQHzg3UQ). - Dankrad's [PoC Verkle trie implementation](https://github.com/ethereum/research/tree/master/verkle_trie_eip). - A report from Dedaub, commissioned by the EF, on [Verkle Trees: Impact study on existing smart contracts](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s3qqzbkQFPcNvhzKPdnxg3MlFbv0YjK1z02SxRtdMs8/edit#heading=h.5izm3ka6fxpk). Don't get me started on "tree" vs "trie". Also on [ethresear.ch](https://ethresear.ch/): - [Private message sharing for ETH2 validators](https://ethresear.ch/t/private-message-sharing-for-eth2-validators/10664?u=benjaminion): a private Eth2 p2p layer that allows for both privacy and spam resistance. - [Differentially Private Uniswap in ETH2](https://ethresear.ch/t/differentially-private-uniswap-in-eth2/10446): makes use of Eth2's Randao to implement partial privacy for trades. ## Regular Calls ### Implementers Call #72 took place on the 9th of September: Altair review and planning, client team updates, and some Merge devnet planning. * [Agenda](https://github.com/ethereum/eth2.0-pm/issues/235) * [Video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3heiZA5j5s&t=101s) * My [quick notes](https://hackmd.io/@benjaminion/S1smzqwzY), and [tweet form](https://twitter.com/ralexstokes/status/1436001554486554626) from Alex Stokes. ### All Core Devs With The Merge looming, I guess we need to start including the long-standing Ethereum All Core Devs calls here. ACD call #121 discussed the consensus--execution engine [API design space](https://hackmd.io/@n0ble/consensus_api_design_space), and a proposal from the Geth team for [syncing](https://github.com/fjl/p2p-drafts/blob/master/merge-sync/merge-sync.md) the post-merge combined network. - [Agenda](https://github.com/ethereum/pm/issues/379) - [Video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxozI0Wpr7I) - [Notes](https://twitter.com/TimBeiko/status/1433831124267147264) from Tim Beiko. ### StakeHouse community call [StakeHouse](https://github.com/stake-house) CC #7 has been pushed back a week to 15th September at 15:00 UTC. Ping Colfax on the [EthStaker Discord](https://discord.com/invite/u2q7FRv) for an invite. Minor updates: [Wagyu](https://github.com/stake-house/wagyu) - the one-click staking installer - now has both a [logo](https://twitter.com/airzin_eth/status/1435673197127548933) and a [Twitter account](https://twitter.com/wagyutools)! ## In other news - The [Obol SSV protocol](https://obol.tech/) announced that they have [been awarded a grant](https://blog.obol.tech/lido-development-grant-to-obol/) from the Lido DAO to continue researching and building trust minimized infrastructure technology. They also announced their [jobs board](https://jobs.lever.co/obol-tech/) - some solid engineering positions there. [Disclosure: I am an advisor to Obol.] - Applications are open for the second cohort of the [Core Dev Apprenticeship](https://blog.ethereum.org/2021/09/06/core-dev-apprenticeship-second-cohort/) programme. It seems that the first was a great success. Hurry! Applications close on the 13th. Take it from me that right now is an incredibly exciting time to be an Ethereum core dev. - To much acclaim, Tim Beiko suggests that we [use the panda emoji](https://twitter.com/TimBeiko/status/1432025839927914497) for The Merge. This 🐼 approves! - Danny Ryan raised almost [65 ETH](https://etherscan.io/address/whenmerge.eth) by [selling NFTs](https://twitter.com/dannyryan/status/1431975362141904899) of the diagrams in his EDCON talk. Proceeds "to be distributed to researchers and developers working on the frontlines of the Merge". ## And finally... Google photos has been reminding me of the Interop Lock-in we did two years ago this week. It was a seminal week for the beacon chain, and hence the future of Ethereum. I was moved to write up [a thread](https://twitter.com/benjaminion_xyz/status/1435706236612272129) with a bunch of photos. It somehow simultaneously feels like only yesterday and a lifetime ago now. This edition brought to you with the assistance of The Dave Brubeck Quartet [at the Carnegie Hall](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFrnCnbEJMQ&list=PL64D93478E0879D5B) (1963). * * * [![[Twitter]](https://benjaminion.xyz/newineth2/img/twitter.svg =40x40)](https://twitter.com/benjaminion_xyz) Follow me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/benjaminion_xyz) to hear when the next edition is out 🙌. [![[RSS]](https://benjaminion.xyz/newineth2/img/rss.svg =32x32)](https://benjaminion.xyz/newineth2/rss_feed.xml) We also have an [RSS feed](https://benjaminion.xyz/newineth2/rss_feed.xml). [Advertising](https://hackmd.io/@benjaminion/eth2_news/https%3A%2F%2Fhackmd.io%2F%40benjaminion%2Fadvertising) on this newsletter. [Give Feedback](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfkESc4CmNfRGHHjWfNeF3ceLwrXDvynetda4sKfJFJ71Oabw/viewform).