What is Ethereum Istanbul Hardfork?
Upcoming Ethereum’s hard fork called ‘Istanbul’ is estimated to take place on December 8. The Ethereum Istanbul will bring several changes that define a transitional step towards the most anticipating version of Ethereum ‘Serenity’, or ETH 2.0.
The hard fork is expected at the block 9069000; check the Istanbul Hard Fork Countdown Clock on Etherscan to be aware of the exact time.
How will Istanbul fork impact Atomic Wallet users?
If you hold Ethereum in Atomic Wallet, there is nothing you need to do. You can manage, buy, exchange ETH the same way as you do.
What is the Istanbul Fork?
The ETH upgrade will introduce a number of developments such as:
- greater interoperability with Zcash
- increased scalability performance for platforms with zero-knowledge privacy technology core
- the modified cost of several codes to prevent spamming blocks and improve denial-of-service attack resilience
Mostly, the second part of the fork that is to be implemented at the beginning of 2020, will make changes to the scaling issue; transaction processing is going to be faster and cheaper. This will lead the network to ‘Serenity’, ETH 2.0, i.e. the networks’ shift to the Proof-of-Stake algorithm.
What is ETH 2.0?
Ethereum 2.0 is expecting to be launched in the first quarter of 2020. This is the ‘ultimate’ version of the network, which is supposed to bring higher security, scalability, and stability. It can happen by moving the world’s second-largest blockchain platform from the Proof-of-Work algorithm (PoW), transaction validation system, to the PoS, a more efficient and scalable consensus algorithm. In more detail, the Serenity version tends to have these features:
- Minimized complexity
- Remaining live through any network divisions and when the larger number of nodes goes offline
- Selection of all the components whether they’re quantum secure, or can be easily swapped for the quantum
- Many minor improvements
Accepted EIPs for the Istanbul Hard Fork
The changes specified in the fork are governed and accepted by the Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIP), the standards that suggest modifications in the core protocol, smart contracts, and the client APIs (Application Programming Interfaces). Out of 38 EIPs, there were only six approved. Below is the outline in more detail.
EIP-152: improving interoperability for ETH / Zcash and other Equihash-based coins – the transactions between the pairs will become faster and more convenient.
EIP-1108: increasing privacy and scaling solutions – the fee for the network’s gas and security solutions will be cheaper.
EIP-1344: adding a unique chain ID for contracts’ tracking – it will prevent the denial attacks on signed transactions.
EIP-1844: the gas fee and resource consumption will be more balanced by repricing the particular network’s operational codes.
EIP-2028: will enable larger block size and a greater network’s scalability by dropping the calling data fee in transactions.
EIP-2200: enabling new contract storage use and reducing the expanded costs adding a new way of usage calculating.
There are many other EIPs under discussion. The most prominent of them touch the prospects of the mining algorithm and the decentralized autonomous organizations’ managing. Not everyone in the community is happy to see these changes before reaching the PoS in ETH 2.0. Although, it’s likely that the EIPs will be in consideration for the fork ‘Berlin’, which is expected next to ‘Istanbul’ in June 2020, according to the Roadmap to Serenity.
If you want to know more about Ethereum – read here.
