Learn the details on what the æternity development community will focus up to the next scheduled hardfork in September.
TL;DR
- The next scheduled hardfork of the æternity protocol will happen in September with the Lima Release.
- Lima will introduce the Fast æternity Transaction Engine (FATE), æternity’s customized virtual machine.
- A governance mechanism based on a Sophia smart contract will be introduced and will make it easier for the community to launch governance votes. Delegated voting and a signaling mechanism for hardfork activation will become available. A governance æpp will be launched.
- IMPORTANT: All AE tokens users must migrate their AE tokens to the Mainnet before September 2 when the smart contract that manages all Ethereum AE tokens will expire.
- Auctions for renting names in the æternity Naming System (AENS) will be launched with Lima.
- A mobile æpp that enables state channel payments will be available during the æternity Universe One conference that will take place in Prague, Bohemia on September 20–21, 2019.
FATE
The Fast æternity Transaction Engine uses transactions as its basic operations and operates directly on the state tree of the æternity chain. This enables native integration with first class objects such as oracles, a naming system, and state channels since those are all managed by specific types of transactions described on the protocol level.
FATE is a simple-to-use machine language, superior to the more traditional byte-code virtual machines currently used on other platforms. It enables easier, safe coding, faster transactions, and smaller code sizes. It is custom-built to seamlessly integrate with the functional smart contract language Sophia.
FATE is expected to be introduced with the Lima hardfork. Deployment of AEVM contracts will continue to be possible after FATE’s launch. It is expected that FATE will introduce developer friendly error messages, a different gas pricing model, and new types of contract calls and return values. Dr. Erik Stenman, Dr. Ulf Norell, and Tobias Lindahl will be leading the FATE development effort.
Learn more about FATE in GitHub and in this WeAreDevelopers interview with Dr. Erik Stenman.
Governance
With the goal to enable the æternity community to launch initiatives such as the BRI, the governance mechanisms will be improved with the Lima hardfork. In this respect the developer community will focus on:
- Enabling “signaling” that automates the process of hardfork activation. A key header info field will be introduced and contain information that could be set by a miner via a config parameter. That information will signal whether the miner supports a proposed hardfork or not. For example, when 90% of mining power signals support for a hardfork — it is automatically activated after a week.
- A Sophia smart contract will be used to enable weighted delegated voting.
- Drafting a detailed specification that determines what exactly could be changed by governance on-chain.
- A client-facing application for initiating and participating in voting proposals.
These make it easy for community members to take part in æternity’s governance and fine-tune system variables such as inflation.
IMPORTANT: Token Migration after the AE Ethereum Smart Contract Freeze
The Ethereum smart contract that manages all ERC20 AE tokens will expire on September 2, 2019 (end of token migration Phase 3). That will make all Ethereum AE tokens non-transferable. It is therefore recommended that all users migrate their AE tokens before September 2.
If you have sent AE tokens directly to the migration contract or you have not migrated your Ethereum tokens prior to the end of Phase 3 you may still be able to access your AE tokens if:
- the AE tokens are/were not managed by a smart contract (multi-signature address on Ethereum, for ex.),
- you have access to the private key(s) / seed(s) / passphrase(s) / hardware wallet device used to store or send the Ethereum AE tokens
A detailed communication will be shared soon. It will explain the different options that users will have in case they do not migrate prior to September 2. In some cases, the AE tokens will become irretrievable. Migrate your tokens now to avoid complications:
State Channels Payment æpp
In order to showcase the most simple functionality of æternity’s state channels, an æpp that can be used to buy various items during the æternity Universe One conference will be developed. It will allow event participants to make payments to multiple points of sale via state channels. To learn more about the first major event dedicated to the æternity ecosystem, visit the Universe One website:
Naming System Auctions
æternity’s protocol-integrated naming system (AENS) enables human-readable names for AE token accounts, including oracles and smart contracts. It is currently possible to associate an account with a test name (.test) and more than 550k names have already been registered for free.
However, in order to achieve a fair distribution of names and a fair price for most valuable names be established, an auction system must be incorporated. The first step will be the drafting of a detailed specification of the auction mechanism and then developing a Sophia smart contract to execute it. Michal Zajda will lead the efforts here. It is expected that the AENS auctions will be ready in time for Lima.
Other Updates
AirDrop
According to the information included in the original announcement of æternity’s campaigns in 2017, 1% of all campaigns-created tokens will be distributed to cryptocurrency holders by a means of an airdrop. The announcement text reads:
“1% will be allocated to people who hold BTC or ETH, accessible soon after the æternity blockchain launches. This means, that everybody who holds BTC or ETH will also automatically become an AE holder.”
The specification required for the airdrop is currently being developed. More details will be shared soon.
Stratum
æternity’s Stratum implementation is published. Here is the relevant documentation:
Virtual State Channels (VSC)
Due to a tight schedule and a long backlog of features to be included in the Lima release, only the consensus-breaking parts of VSC will be included in there.
The development community will focus on building a functioning and user-friendly payment æpp that will use state channels. The æpp will lay down the groundwork required to make state channels easier to incorporate in æpps, which is currently a high priority.
Native Tokens (NT)
Once integrated, NT will become a first-class object in the æternity protocol. This will enable a wide range of native features currently unavailable in smart contract-managed tokens. Native Tokens will not be part of Lima but work implementing them has already started.
If you are interested in contributing to the æternity project by developing tools, oracles services, applications or anything else, please share your idea in the Forum. Your work could be supported by AE tokens.
UPDATE: æternity’s Lima hardfork was successfully executed on October 30th, 2019 at block height 161150. The æternity’s Mainnet is now running Lima Release 5.0.1. Learn more here.
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