Ethereum developers target March 2023 for Shanghai hard fork

According to a discussion at the 151st Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Core Developers Meeting on Dec. 8, core programmers set a tentative deadline of March 2023 for the Shanghai hard fork. In addition, developers will aim for May or June 2023 to launch Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Improvement Protocol (EIP) 4844 upgrade that will introduce proto-danksharding to the network. 

Although the much-anticipated proof-of-stake Merge upgrade was completed on Sept. 15, staked Ether (stETH), are currently locked on the Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Beacon Chain. The token is created by decentralized finance protocol Lido with close to 3.5 million stETH ($4.48 billion) in circulation. After the Shanghai upgrade, stETH users can withdraw their funds along with any applicable staking rewards for validating network transactions. The Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Foundation said that it structured the upgrades in this manner to “simplify and maximize focus on a successful transition to proof-of-stake.”

After the hard fork, the EIP-4844 upgrade is designed to introduce a new data-blob-transaction prototype previously invented by developers on Feb. 21, 2022. Currently, layer-2 technologies such as optimism rollups can move Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) computation and network storage off-chain to improve scalability by 10x to 100x. Developers anticipate that by introducing large portable bundles that can contain cheaper data in Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) transactions, it can improve the capacity of rollups by up to 100x. However, while the upgrade will lower the transaction fees on layer-2 solutions, it will not affect Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) gas fees.

At $1,609.40 ) Denver?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@ Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Denver we hacked together a full data-blob-transaction prototype! (a.k.a. mini-danksharding)

Data blobs are the first milestone towards full ethereum sharding, enabling rollups like @optimismPBC to grow 100x in capacity.

Here’s a tweet thread about the prototype

— proto.eth (@protolambda) February 20, 2022

Last December, co-founder Vitalik Buterin shared that his endgame was for Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) to act as a simple base-layer while users are “fully comfortable storing their assets in a ZK [zero-knowledge]-rollup running a full EVM [ Ethereum ( $1,609.40 ) Virtual Machine].” Buterin also warned that sharding and data availability sampling are “complex technologies” and would take years of audits and refinement to implement.