Christine Kim, a researcher at Galaxy Digital, described the upcoming Ethereum upgrade known as Prague-Electra, also known as Pectra, as “possibly the largest in Ethereum’s history.” in string At X, Kim demonstrated the code changes and highlighted how Pectra could fundamentally change Ethereum's operational and security models.
Why is the Ethereum Pectra update so huge?
Pectra follows the successful implementation of the Dencun upgrade, which was rolled out in March 2023, making it the next significant advance for the Ethereum network. It integrates a variety of Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) targeting key aspects of network functionality from cryptographic improvements to improving system efficiency. Here's a closer look at all of Prague's changes:
- EIP-2537: This EIP is intended to add operations to the BLS12-381 curve as a pre-compile. This step is necessary to implement processes such as BLS signature verification, enhance security through more robust cryptographic proofs, and facilitate better interoperability with the Ethereum Beacon Chain.
- EIP-2935: Written by Vitalik Buterin and others, EIP-2935 proposes storing the last 8192 hash blocks in the storage slots of the system nodes. This allows for stateless execution and is an essential step towards the upcoming Verkle Trees upgrade, which aims to significantly reduce state size and improve network scalability.
- EIP-7685: This proposal, authored by Lightclient, provides a general-purpose bus for sharing EL requests run with CL. Its implementation is expected to simplify the process of testing code and deploying execution-triggered requests, such as those related to consensus layer changes.
- EOF (Ethereum Object Format): This is a group of 10 EIPs that revamps how EVM bytecode is processed. The expected result is to improve the decentralized application developer experience by making the execution of smart contract instructions more efficient, logically sound, consistent, and upgradable.
- EIP-7702: Proposed by Vitalik Buterin, Sam Wilson, Ansgar Dietrichs, and Mat Garnett, this EIP aims to introduce a new transaction type that allows a token to be assigned to Externally Owned Accounts (EOA) during a transaction. This can significantly improve the user experience by enabling transaction aggregation, supported transactions, and more flexible control of EOAs.
Several key EIPs have been confirmed for the Electra portion of the upgrade, addressing critical aspects of validations and system efficiency:
- EIP-6110: This EIP proposes to provide validator deposits as a list of deposit operations added to the implementation layer block. This change simplifies the auditor experience by removing the need for deposit voting, reducing the complexity of client software, and reducing the delay between a deposit transaction being sent and it being processed on the consensus layer.
- EIP-7002: Written by Danny Ryan and others, this allows auditors to enable partial checkouts and withdrawals using their implementation layer withdrawal credentials, enhancing the design of trustless staking suites.
- EIP-7251 and EIP-7549: These proposals focus on improving validator balance configurations and improving the efficiency of certificates within blocks, which could reduce network bandwidth requirements and enhance overall security.
Uncertainty and timeline
Kim also revealed that “besides the confirmed EIPs for Pectra, developers are also working on some parallel initiatives like PeerDAS, end-of-date, and client-light development. Depending on how things go, we could see new EIPs included in Pectra later on.”
It highlights that many EIPs are currently being implemented on devnets, representing a shift in Ethereum's governance process. This strategic phasing allows the community to adjust the scope of the upgrade based on real-world testing results, ensuring robustness and stability before full deployment.
The active participation of the Ethereum developer community is crucial, with ongoing discussions, testing, and feedback shaping the final configuration of the Pecta upgrade. The next phases include further devnet implementations and community reviews, with some EIPs likely to be deferred to subsequent upgrades depending on their readiness and impact assessment.
Finally, “It's unclear how big or small Pectra actually is since developers aren't sure which EIPs will be activated together and which will be activated separately,” Kim concluded. The Ethereum core development team has set a goal to deploy the Pectra upgrade by the first quarter of 2025.
At press time, Ethereum was trading at $3,807.
Featured image created with DALL·E, chart from TradingView.com
