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Vitalik Buterin suggests ways to speed up ETH transactions confirmations

Vitalik Buterin suggests ways to speed up ETH transactions confirmations

Ethereum co-founder unveils revolutionary features to speed up ETH transactions. The new feature, known as Single Slot Finality (SSF), aims to make Ethereum transactions nearly instantaneous by streamlining the consensus-building process on the network.

ETH Transactions

With Ethereum’s ongoing development, Vitalik Buterin’s latest announcement underscores the continuous efforts to enhance efficiency and scalability. The debut of Single Slot Finality (SSF) marks a pivotal step in improving the network’s capacity to process transactions swiftly and securely.

Buterin introduced this innovative solution in a blog post titled “Epochs and slots all the way down: ways to give Ethereum users faster transaction confirmation times.” Currently, Ethereum’s Gasper consensus mechanism uses a slot and epoch architecture, where a subset of validators can broadcast a vote on the chain’s head every 12 seconds, and all validators have 32 slots (6.4 minutes) to vote.

https://twitter.com/VitalikButerin/status/1807503026548289862

After two epochs (12.8 minutes), these votes are transformed into messages in a consensus mechanism similar to PBFT, providing a strong economic guarantee known as finality. However, this current method has been increasingly criticized for its lengthy and complex process.

Introduction of Single Slot Finality

Users have expressed frustration with the slot-by-slot voting system and the epoch-by-epoch finality mechanism, finding the 12.8-minute wait excessively long. The introduction of Single Slot Finality is set to revolutionize this process.

SSF will replace the existing approach with a system more akin to Tendermint consensus, where block N is finalized before block N+1 is created. Unlike Tendermint, SSF retains the “inactivity leak” mechanism, ensuring the chain remains operational and can recover even if over one-third of the validators go offline.

Despite the promise of faster transaction times, SSF also presents potential challenges. If not implemented carefully, it could require every Ethereum staker to post two messages every 12 seconds, which might place a significant load on the network.

Two Distinct Pre-confirmation Systems

According to Buterin’s blog post, the SSF feature offers two distinct pre-confirmation approaches: Rollup pre-confirmations and Based pre-confirmations.

Rollup pre-confirmations create a division of responsibilities within the Ethereum ecosystem. Layer 1 solutions will focus on being censorship-resistant, reliable, stable, and maintaining a fundamental core of functionality. Meanwhile, layer 2 solutions will engage directly with users, making various technological and cultural compromises to enhance user experience.

On the other hand, the Based pre-confirmations strategy envisions ETH proposers evolving into highly skilled players for MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) purposes. This approach incentivizes these expert proposers to offer pre-confirmations-as-a-service, leveraging their expertise to enhance the network.

Conclusion

To conclude, to speed up ETH transactions, Vitalik Buterin’s introduction of Single Slot Finality heralds a significant advancement for the Ethereum network, promising to drastically reduce transaction confirmation times. This innovative feature, along with its dual pre-confirmation systems, underscores Ethereum’s commitment to scalability and efficiency, reflecting a growing trust in cryptocurrency as a viable asset class among institutional and retail investors.

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