Ethereum is gearing up for a major upgrade called the Shanghai/Capella upgrade, which is scheduled to launch on April 12, 2023, at 6:27 PM (ET). To ensure a smooth transition, developers are encouraging all node operators on Ethereum to upgrade their nodes in advance of the upgrade.
Ethereum developers have been working tirelessly to make changes to the consensus layer of Ethereum, coordinating through their bi-weekly All Core Developers Consensus (ACDC) call series. On the latest call, representatives from Ethereum client teams provided updates on the status of their final releases for the Shanghai/Capella upgrade.
According to the developers, the final client releases for the upgrade are expected to be ready early next week. The client teams include Prysm (CL) client, Teku (CL) client, Nimbus (CL) client, Lodestar (CL) client, Lighthouse (CL) client, Nethermind (EL) client, and Geth (EL) client.
Once all final client releases are published, the Ethereum Foundation will compile them into a blog post on its website, which node operators are urged to look out for. The final client releases will be subjected to one final mainnet shadow fork test to verify their performance and functionality.
In addition to testing, the maximum bug bounty for identifying a vulnerability in the upgrade has been doubled from $250,000 to $500,000 between now and the time of the fork. The bug bounty program encourages developers to test the system for vulnerabilities and report them to the Ethereum Foundation through its website.
Ethereum developers are also preparing upgrades to MEV-Boost software and will hold a third MEV-Boost community call on March 30, 2023, to educate at-home validator node operators, staking pools, MEV builders, and relays about the new software releases related to MEV-Boost.
Moreover, the developers are working on updating the serialization scheme used by Ethereum’s EL so that it is consistent with the scheme used by Ethereum’s CL. Decoupling blocks from blobs is another topic of discussion among developers, with the aim of improving network performance.
