Summary of the latest meeting of Ethereum core developers: Pectra upgrade, re-establishing PeerDAS
On August 15, all core developers of Ethereum participated in the 194th All Core Developers Execution (ACDE) conference call.Original Title: 《Ethereum All Core Developers Execution Call #194 Writeup》
Author: Christine Kim
Compiled by: Ladyfinger, BlockBeats
Editor’s Note:
The Ethereum All Core Developers Execution Call (ACDE) is held bi-weekly to primarily discuss and coordinate changes to the Ethereum Execution Layer (EL). This is the 194th ACDE call, where the focus was on EIP 7732, updated analysis of gas costs for EIP 2537 operations, and topics such as PeerDAS.
During the meeting, Geth developer Marius van der Wijden proposed a method to remove pre-merge fields from the Ethereum wire protocol to reduce node bandwidth during synchronization. Christine Kim, Vice President of Research at Galaxy Digital, took detailed notes on the key points of the meeting, and BlockBeats has compiled the original text as follows:
On August 15, 2024, the 194th Ethereum Core Developers Execution Call (ACDE) was hosted by Ethereum Foundation researcher Alex Stokes. The meeting primarily discussed changes and coordination issues related to the Execution Layer (EL).
This week, developers updated the testing progress regarding the Pectra upgrade. Subsequently, they discussed the readiness of EOF code changes, which are planned to be included in the Pectra development network, and updated the gas cost analysis for EIP 2537 operations. Prysm developer "Potuz" introduced EIP 7732, a formal proposal aimed at establishing a separation between proposers and builders within the Ethereum protocol. Erigon developer Giulio Rebuffo proposed removing the "totalDifficulty" field from the execution API to reduce technical debt in Ethereum clients. Geth developer Marius van der Wijden suggested removing some pre-merge fields and messages from the Ethereum wire protocol to decrease bandwidth consumption during node synchronization. Developers also briefly discussed resetting the PeerDAS specification on top of Pectra instead of Dencun and shared updates on the progress of implementing EIP 4444.
Pectra Devnets
Pectra Devnet 2 is quite stable. There seems to be an outstanding issue on the Devnet 2 information page related to the pre-merge block builder specification and testing them on the devnet. EF development operations engineer Parithosh Jayanthi mentioned that there are also issues with Teku/Erigon nodes and the Prysm client.
The goal for developers is to launch Pectra Devnet 3 with EIP 7702 updated specifications within two weeks. If everything goes as planned, developers intend to add EOF to the development network afterward, leading to Pectra Devnet 4.
Geth developer Marius van der Wijden shared the latest analysis of gas costs for EIP 2537. As background, the EIP creates new precompiles for BLS12-381 curve operations, allowing smart contract developers to perform operations like signature aggregation economically on the BLS12-381 curve. Van der Wijden proposed re-pricing the precompiles based on benchmarks he and Geth team colleague Jared Wasinger developed for BLS operations and their gas usage on various machines. Van der Wijden encouraged other developers to run their benchmarks on EIP 2537 gas usage to validate the results.
EIP 7732
Prysm developer "Potuz" shared updates on EIP 7732, which is an in-protocol solution that directly connects validators with third-party block builders. Since the merge, validators have relied on intermediaries known as relays to receive blocks that include MEV rewards. EIP 7732 eliminates the need for relays, allowing validators to obtain MEV in a more trustless manner. Potuz emphasized that the current design of EIP 7732 does not require changes to the Execution Layer (EL) or Engine API. He added that EIP 7732 is also compatible with inclusion lists, a proposal that allows validators to enforce the inclusion of transactions in blocks. More information about EIP 7732 can be found in this Google Slides presentation.
Reducing Pre-Merge Technical Debt
Since Ethereum transitioned to proof of stake, certain parts of the Ethereum codebase have become obsolete or unnecessary. For example, the difficulty bomb, which is a mechanism that forces development work to be based on proof of stake, making it impossible to create blocks through proof of work after a certain period. The following two proposals aim to remove such parts from the codebase to improve node performance and reduce protocol complexity.
- Erigon developer Giulio Rebuffo proposed removing the "totalDifficulty" field from the execution API.
- Geth developer Marius van der Wijden proposed removing some pre-merge fields and messages from the Ethereum wire protocol.
Other developers provided positive feedback on these two proposals during the call. Developers agreed to review both in more detail asynchronously after the meeting.
PeerDAS
Regarding PeerDAS, a Nimbus developer known as "Dustin" suggested accelerating the rebase of PeerDAS on top of the Pectra EIP rather than continuing to develop PeerDAS on Deneb. He noted that there are some unstable EIPs in Pectra that may change, such as EIP 7702 and EOF. Dustin proposed to re-establish PeerDAS on a stable subset of Pectra EIPs and exclude EIP 7702 and EOF transactions from the PeerDAS development network. Developers discussed other ways to start rebuilding the PeerDAS foundation on Pectra. There was general support for this direction, and progress began toward it.
Stokes reminded call participants that starting next Monday at 2 PM (UTC), regular Pectra testing calls will be held to further coordinate devnet specifications and timelines.
EIP 4444
There are no significant updates on EIP 4444. Representatives from the Nethermind and Nimbus teams stated that they are building a collaboration with the Portal Network, an alternative network protocol for users to access expired historical data.
