Week in Ethereum News, December 14, 2024
Eth News and Links
Stakers can increase gas limit to 36M
Eth R&D protocol call (All Core Devs)
Consensus layer focused protocol call (ACDC #147):
Pectra upgrade:
Mekong testnet: stable, gas limit increased to 36M
Gas limit increase: restricted by gossip limit, consensus layer teams to check spec conformity & consider how best to handle gas/gossip limits, gossip limit won’t be increased for now
Aim to launch over the holidays
EIP7742 uncouple blob count between CL/EL: replaced by EIP7840 execution layer config to set max & target blob count
EIP7251 max effective balance: minor changes
EIP7762 increase min base fee: not included, L2s work around
EIP2537 BLS precompile: gas repricing proposed, final MSM benchmarks required before ACDE next week
Fusaka upgrade:
PeerDAS rebasing on top of Pectra
CFI/SFI statuses: considered for inclusion (CFI) EIPs should be in a future upgrade devnet & scheduled for inclusion (SFI) EIPs will be in the next upgrade devnet
Pectra (Prague + Electra) upgrade
Client testing call #16: Mekong testnet 98% participation, minor changes in pectra-devnet-5 spec and consensus layer client teams discussed gossip limit
Fusaka (Osaka + Fulu) upgrade
EOF implementers call #63: Solidity working on EOF as experimental feature and discussed metadata section
Layer 1
Toni Wahrstätter: increase gas limit to 36M, beyond 40M currently unsafe due to gossip limit, review again after Pectra upgrade
Prysm cannot set gas limit through validator client currently
FOCIL breakout #1: consensus layer spec relatively stable, aim for devnet at end of January
L1 R&D workshops: notes from pre-Devcon workshops
Research
Execution Tickets evaluated using agent-based simulation: validator decentralization & MEV capture is promising but questions remain for builder centralization, off-chain agreements & multi-block MEV
EF academic grants round: summary of 39 completed & in progress results from 2022 grants
Centralization watch: threatening the value of your ETH
🚨 Lido at 28.4%, still too close to 33.3% threshold
Client diversity (via clientdiversity.org):
Execution layer: Geth ~43% & Nethermind ~36% (estimate based on 74% self reported data)
Consensus layer: Prysm 35%
Any client bug over 33.3% could mean loss of finality
Better geographic diversity is optimal, particularly outside of North America & Europe
Client Releases
Consensus layer:
Execution layer:
Besu v24.12.0: breaking changes including metric name updates
Erigon v3.0.0-alpha6: default mode changed from archive to full node, adds minimal prune mode for low disk space users and performance improvements
Nethermind v1.30.0: default gas limit increased to 36M and adds Taiko & Linea L2 support; v1.30.1: startup fix
Reth v1.1.3: breaking API changes, adds NodePrimitives (primitive trait abstraction) to several components; v1.1.4: op-reth fix
Layer 2
RollCall #9 (L2 standards):
Pectra upgrade: L2s don’t use or can work around fee history being removed and are ok with not including EIP7762 as they work around min blob base fee
Overview of L2 execution common core project
EIPs/Standards
EIPs (Ethereum improvement proposals):
ERCs (application layer):
Stuff for developers
Ape v0.8.22 (Python contract framework): 2x faster checksumming, updated isolation and adds support for web3.py v7 & python v3.13
Heimdall-rs v0.8.5: adds LLM postprocessing to decompiler
CTFs:
Secureum RACE #35: answers to 8 question Solidity quiz
Safe multisig transaction hashes (Bash script): adds support for offchain message hashes
Security
Clober (DEX) $500k exploit on Base via reentrancy
1inch resolver contract exploit via private key compromise
Radiant Capital October $50M exploit update, developer shared zipped PDF containing macOS malware received from impersonator of former contractor
Job Listings
Mimic: Tech Lead Engineer
Vyper (Pythonic EVM language) seek a DevRel
Job listings: $600 for 4 issues (75 char limit). Pay using 3cities. Questions? abcoathup at-gmail
Onchain stats
Fees (via ultrasound.money):
Gas: 6.1 to 226.6 gwei, 18.7 gwei average; zero net issuance at 24.1 gwei
4.4k ETH net issuance this week
ETHUSD: $3,538 - $4,021, currently $3,921 all time high $4,878
ETHBTC: currently 0.039 (Flippening at ~0.164)
Ecosystem
ETHIndia top ten hackathon projects
Notable at app layer
Sablier Flow: open-ended streams with top ups for recurring payments
General
END OF SERVICE: plan to deprecate Week in Ethereum News
Editor: @abcoathup
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Permalink: https://weekinethereumnews.com/week-in-ethereum-news-december-14-2024
Upcoming Dates of Note
(new/changes in bold)
Dec 20 – ETH Rangers application deadline
Jan 20 – Ethereum protocol attackathon ends
Jan 30-31 – EthereumZuri.ch conference
Feb 23 - Mar 2 – ETHDenver
Apr 4-6 – ETHGlobal Taipei hackathon
May 9-11 – ETHDam (Amsterdam) conference & hackathon
May 27-29 – ETHPrague conference
May 30 - Jun 1 – ETHGlobal Prague hackathon
Jun 3-8 – ETH Belgrade conference & hackathon
Jun 12-13 – Protocol Berg (Berlin) conference
Jun 16-18 – DappCon (Berlin)
Jun 26-28 – ETHCluj (Romania) conference
Jun 30 - Jul 3 – EthCC (Cannes) conference
Jul 4-6 – ETHGlobal Cannes hackathon
Aug 15-17 – ETHGlobal New York hackathon
Sep 26-28 – ETHGlobal New Delhi hackathon
Nov – ETHGlobal Devconnect hackathon
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