Ethereum (ETH) Developers Address Core Issues in Consensus Call #139

On
August
8,
2024,
Ethereum
(ETH)
developers
convened
over
Zoom
for
the
bi-weekly
All
Core
Developers
Consensus
(ACDC)
call
#139,
according
to

galaxy.com.
The
meeting,
chaired
by
Ethereum
Foundation
(EF)
Researcher
Alex
Stokes,
focused
on
various
updates
and
changes
to
the
consensus
layer
(CL)
of
Ethereum,
also
known
as
the
Beacon
Chain.

Pectra
Updates

EF
Researcher
Hsiao
Wei
Wang
is
gearing
up
for
the
next
official
release,
alpha.4,
of
the
Pectra
CL
specifications,
which
will
incorporate
numerous
fixes.
EF
Developer
Operations
Engineer
Barnabas
Busa
reported
that
Pectra
Devnet
2
has
achieved
85%
network
participation,
despite
a
few
bugs
in
execution
layer
(EL)
clients,
particularly
EthereumJS
and
Erigon.
However,
most
CL
clients
are
stable.
Discussions
also
included
the
need
for
better
communication
regarding
the
launch
of
Devnet
3,
leading
to
plans
for
a
weekly
meeting
series
for
testing
updates.

Developers
reconfirmed
that
Pectra
Devnet
3
would
retain
the
same
set
of
EIPs
as
Devnet
2
but
would
feature
the
updated
EIP
7702
design.
Lodestar
developer
Gajinder
Singh
highlighted
issues
found
with
EIP
7251
on
Devnet
2,
which
will
require
further
testing.
Additionally,
a
new
Engine
API
specification,
“getBlobsV1,”
was
introduced
to
fetch
blobs
from
the
EL
blob
transaction
mempool,
and
Teku
developer
Enrico
del
Fante
proposed
clarifications
to
avoid
misuse.

PeerDAS
Updates

Representatives
from
the
Prysm
client
team
shared
updates
on
their
PeerDAS
implementation,
sparking
discussions
on
the
necessity
of
the
“blobsidecar”
Engine
API
request.
Formal
specifications
for
removing
sampling
from
PeerDAS
have
been
drafted
to
reduce
upgrade
complexity,
although
concerns
were
raised
about
the
potential
difficulty
of
reintroducing
sampling
in
a
future
hard
fork.

Research
Updates

Three
key
research
topics
were
discussed.
First,
edge
cases
in
consolidating
staked
ETH
balances
under
EIP
7251
were
examined,
with
recommendations
to
acknowledge
these
in
CL
specifications.
Second,
changes
to
Ethereum’s
networking
layer,
specifically
the
addition
of
a
“quic
ENR
entry,”
were
recommended
for
further
detailing
in
a
GitHub
pull
request.
Finally,
blockchain
analytics
firm
ProbeLab
shared
data
on
Ethereum
node
distribution,
identifying
8,335
nodes,
with
42%
running
on
the
Lighthouse
client
and
36%
operated
by
U.S.
users.

The
meeting
concluded
with
a
request
from
Prysm
developer
“Potuz”
for
developers
to
review
his
pull
request
on
changes
to
the
execution
payload
structure,
emphasizing
the
need
for
a
timely
decision
due
to
the
complexity
of
incorporating
these
changes
into
CL
specifications.

Image
source:
Shutterstock