Week in Ethereum News, November 9, 2024
Eth News and Links
EF 2024 report & conflict of interest policy and Mekong testnet (Pectra public testnet) live
Eth R&D protocol call (All Core Devs)
Execution layer focused protocol call (ACDE #200):
Pectra upgrade:
Pectra-devnet-4: testing planned during Devcon & will then be deprecated
Pectra-devnet-5 spec:
EIP7702: EXTCODE* delegation behavior removed
Proposal to return fee from getter for EIP7002 & EIP7251 system contracts, review async, audits started
Fusaka upgrade:
Activate EOF/PeerDAS separately for testing: agreed to enable as separate consensus layer & execution layer upgrades
EIP7801 eth/70 - sharded blocks protocol: proposal for short term alternative to integrating Portal Network to serve historical data
EIP7610 revert creation for non-empty storage: EIP was previously retroactively included but some client teams have issues implementing, alternative to be proposed
Pectra (Prague + Electra) upgrade
Mekong testnet: Pectra public testnet with devnet-4 spec
Weekly testing call #12: peerdas-devnet-4 & EOF devnet to be based on pectra-devnet-5 spec, ideally by the end of November
Fusaka (Osaka + Fulu) upgrade
EVM Object Format (EOF) benefits for ZK proofs: benchmarks show 2.9x more efficient for total & interpreter cycles, runs 2.7x faster and proof size 2x smaller
Amsterdam upgrade
Layer 1
Flashbots:
rbuilder running in-process with Reth
Parallel block building: backtesting shows better blocks 50% of the time in high MEV
Research
3-slot finality (3SF): finalize blocks within 3 slots using only one voting phase per slot, compared with single slot finality which uses three voting phases per slot
Orbit single-slot finality design: proposal simplifies committee formation
Random execution auctions (randEAs): mitigate multi-block MEV by auctioning proposing rights for a slot window but exact slot only assigned & revealed one slot in advance
Full DAS analysis: fast sampling can be performed at scale, network can absorb large correlated failures but malicious majority attacks remain a challenge
Centralization watch: threatening the value of your ETH
🚨 Lido at 27.8%, still too close to 33.3% threshold
Client diversity (via clientdiversity.org):
Execution layer: Geth ~52% majority
Consensus layer: Prysm 37% & Lighthouse 33.3%
Any client bug over 33.3% could mean loss of finality
Better geographic diversity is optimal, particularly outside of North America & Europe
Client Releases
Execution layer:
For stakers
Beaconcha.in v2 beta (explorer): real-time monitoring, custom validator groups and adds validator efficiency metric
BuidlGuidl client: one line command to run Reth + Lighthouse
Layer 2
Marius Van Der Wijden: EVM-semi compatible rollup design, higher throughput but higher trust assumptions
EIPs/Standards
EIPs (Ethereum improvement proposals):
RIPs (rollup improvement proposals):
Meta RIP7810: RIP Purpose and Guidelines
ERCs (application layer):
Stuff for developers
Solar: Solidity compiler frontend in Rust; Apache/MIT license
Devcon faucet: claim 100 testnet ETH for Mekong, Sepolia & Holešky using ticket on Zupass
Etherscan EIP2535 Diamond proxy support, beta
Wevm Ox v0.1 (TypeScript): unopinionated low-level utilities & types
Convert Bank challenge CTF from Foundry to Tevm
Coinbase OnchainKit NFTMintCard (React component): mint NFTs
Micro-eth-signer v0.12.1: adds Verkle JavaScript implementation
Security
Cross-chain token recovery: script to recover funds sent to a contract address on a chain where the contract didn’t exist and a list of projects that may be able to recover funds
Ecosystem
Core values: long term thinking, subtraction & stewardship of values
Spending:
$105.4M in 2022: $38.2M internal & $67.2M external
$134.9M in 2023: $50.2M internal & $84.7M external
22 EF teams
Treasury:
$970.2M (at Oct 31), $788.7M crypto (99.45% ETH) & $181.5M non-crypto; includes remaining 26,701 ETH for client incentive program
EF conflict of interest policy v1: internal disclosures; discussion group to review prior to starting outside work above cap, angel investing, investing & co-founding; outside work paid in illiquid assets with unknown market value generally prohibited
Justin Drake & Dankrad Feist drop EigenLayer advisorships
Josh Stark: Ethereum's distinctive property is hardness
Evan’s dumbing down of Vitalik’s roadmap explainers: the Scourge
Enterprise
Detroit to accept crypto for fees & taxes using PayPal in mid 2025
Job Listings
Executive Director for Enterprise Ethereum Alliance
Job listings: $600 for 4 issues (75 char limit). Pay using 3cities. Questions? abcoathup at-gmail
Onchain stats
Fees (via ultrasound.money):
Gas: 1.9 to 84.4 gwei, 10.3 gwei average; zero net issuance at 24.3 gwei
10.5k ETH net issuance this week
ETHUSD: $2,374 - $2,976, currently $2,959, all time high $4,878
ETHBTC: currently 0.039 (Flippening at ~0.164)
Notable at app layer
Synthetix acquires Kwenta after spinning it out in 2020
MakerDAO votes for Sky brand to stay
Safe proposers: authorized addresses can prepare transactions for owners to review
Regulation/business/tokens
Michigan pension fund buys more ETH than BTC via ETFs
General
Okta vulnerability for usernames above 52 characters
END OF SERVICE: plan to deprecate Week in Ethereum News
Editor: @abcoathup
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Permalink: https://weekinethereumnews.com/week-in-ethereum-news-november-9-2024
Upcoming Dates of Note
(new/changes in bold)
Nov 12-15 – Devcon 7 - Southeast Asia (Bangkok)
Nov 15-17 – ETHGlobal Bangkok hackathon
Dec 4-5 – Columbia CryptoEconomics workshop (New York)
Dec 6-8 – ETHIndia hackathon
Jan 30-31 – EthereumZuri.ch conference
Feb 23 - Mar 2 – ETHDenver
May 9-11 – ETHDam (Amsterdam)
May 30 - Jun 4 – ETH Belgrade hackathon & conference
Jun 12-13 – Protocol Berg (Berlin)
Jun 16-18 – DappCon (Berlin)
Jun 26-28 – ETHCluj (Romania) conference
Jun 30 - Jul 3 – EthCC (Cannes) conference
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