Week in Ethereum News, May 17, 2020 - thank you to Trail of Bits!
Eth News and Links
Eth1
Geth v1.9.14 - unindex and save disk space
OpenEthereum v3. Formerly the Parity client. Support for eth/64, breaking database changes to save disk space. Deprecating light client, auto updater, and private transactions
cross-client consensus tests v7
Latest core devs call. Beiko’s notes from the call, largely around EIPs for next hard fork, eg: 2315 (evm subroutines), 2537 (precompile for curve in eth2), 2046 (reduce gas for static calls to precompiles) and 2565 (repricing the 198 precompile)
EVM+384 bit arithmetic as an alternative to EIP2537’s precompile
Discussion of a second method for resource accounting alongside gas: oil from Suhabe Bugrara, separately formulated as karma from Martin Swende. Or a counterproposal from Vitalik: per account gas limits
The case for Eth-collateralized tokenized gas at the protocol level
Eth2
Latest what’s new in eth2, featuring Ben’s thoughts on timelines
Latest eth2 implementer call. Notes from Ben and Mamy, targeting June for the multi-client testnet
Schlesi testnet: Teku is fully participating and Nimbus is almost fully syncing, though there was a chain split this weekend
Proof of custody through occasional checks and slashing
Stethoscope: networking test suite
Idea from Justin Drake on putting price feed oracles in eth2 via validators, and a counter-proposal from Vitalik Buterin
Layer2
What are the true finality guarantees of state channels? Depends on liveness of layer 1 chain
This newsletter is made possible by Trail of Bits!
Trail of Bits recently reported and fixed 12 security issues in projects across Ethereum, some of them critical. Read more about what they were and how they found them in Bug Hunting with Crytic.
Stuff for developers
Solidity v0.6.8, some important bugfixes
Austin Griffith tutorial: build smart contract wallet with social recovery using React
If you haven’t watched Austin’s wtf is eth.build video, you should. It’s under 3 minutes, funny, and informative.
Running the Incubed light client with Python
OpenZeppelin Contracts v3, but modified to be safe for upgrades
Mainnet testing with your own node using Brownie
headlong: ABI v2 and RLP for the JVM
EthPM v3 - spec for v3 of Eth package manager is in last call
12 bugs found by Trail of Bits’ Crytic tool using 90+ detectors
Verifiable randomness on-chain using the Chainlink VRF
Ecosystem
Tornado.cash finished the largest trusted setup ceremony to date, operator soon to be set to null
Some interesting findings in ConsenSys's eth2 staking survey
A guide to building with MACI - an anti-collusion demo using SNARKs
Enterprise
Where to use the Baseline protocol: sharing business process automation with counterparties
Brave releases Mjolnir tool for easy deploying and benchmarking permissioned Eth chains
Application layer
Building on ethtrader’s DONUT, Reddit unveils community points for r/fortniteBR and r/cryptocurrency subreddits. At the moment, 9000 wallets created for fortnite and just 2100 for r/cryptocurrency. Currently on Rinkeby testnet with plans to move to mainnet.
Dfinity’s first Swiss employee Robert Lauko now working on Liquity stablecoin, low collateralization with algorithmic liquidation via stability pool
“Augur v2 core contracts are finalized and in a code-freeze state, and the trading UI is undergoing performance testing”
Aave changes its interest rate model. Inflection point in the curve now 8% and 90% usage.
Kyber hit 1 billion USD worth of trades
Brave at 14m MAU/5m DAU
Sai successfully shut down on May 12 and now is redeemable for ETH
Hasu: the future of cryptomoney is central banking. An analysis of Maker’s options and decisions
Utah County (Provo) in Utah offering marriage licenses certified with the hash on Eth mainnet
dydx’s BTC/USDC perpetual with 10x leverage is open to the public, and compares centralized and decentralized perpetual markets
Tokens/Business/Regulation
ErisX launches ETH futures, physically delivered, monthly and quarterly contracts
RAC’s $TAPE launched on Zora and went from $20 to $1000. $TAPE is a token redeemable for a special edition cassette of RAC’s latest album. Interesting new model for artists to capture value
General
Wired’s story on MalwareTech/Marcus Hutchins, from stopping WannaCry to FBI arrest
the main idea in HALO snark construction
Open cryptography problems: improving stealth addresses and ideal vector commitment
Housekeeping
Follow me on Twitter @evan_van_ness to get the annotated edition of this newsletter, usually forthcoming in a day or so, as well as a real-time source of Eth news.
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Dates of Note
Upcoming dates of note (new/changes in bold):
May 18 - Book of Swarm launch
May 22-31 - Ethereum Madrid public health virtual hackathon
May 26 - last day to apply for Ethereum India fellowship
May 29-June 16 - SOSHackathon
June 17 - EthBarcelona R&D workshop