The developers of Ethereum 2.0 released the specs for the “official” testnet on Wednesday, before an alleged year-end release. The testnet will start on August 4 and has been named “Medalla” after the Buenos Aires metro stop.
In this case, “official” means that Testnet is implemented by the Ethereum Foundation (EF). The testnet is still run by a decentralized group of code developers, developers, and auditors organized by fork coordinator Afri Schoedon.
Official also means that the network’s code base is almost ready for launch, as investors and developers have begun to sting the launch of the multi-year project. Eth 2.0 researcher Justin Drake recently announced a unilateral effort to ship the first part of the network before the end of the year due to a pullback at a later date.
Medalla joins multiple pre-tests of the Eth 2.0 codebank in various client implementations, including Görli, Witti, Schlesi and, most recently, Altona.
“The Schlesi testnet was one of many steps in that direction. Witti’s testnet was another. Altona’s testnet is yet another. The Medal testnet is intended to be the last before the mainnet launch, ”Schoedon said on the GitHub testnet on Wednesday.
Prysmatic Labs (Prysm), PegaSys (Teku), Status (Nimbus), and Sigma Prime (Lighthouse) customers have participated in all the latest test networks. The four clients plus one, Chainsafe’s Loadstar, have the ability to join Medalla, says GitHub.
Additionally, each testnet has chosen to practice or focus on different parts of the Eth 2.0 launch sequence, given the huge technical challenges associated with moving a functioning blockchain network to a completely different consensus algorithm.
In the case of Medalla, the testnet will focus on improving the experience to move the ether (ETH) to the new network in what is called “stakeout”. As Schoedon explained:
Medal means “medal” and can be seen as a reference to the Olympic testnet that was used to prepare for the launch of ETH1. Emphasizes the importance of the network at this stage for the launch of ETH2. It can also be seen as a clue that Medal validators will receive a “medal” proof of attendance on the Ethereum network to participate.
Eth 2.0 developers have also recently released comprehensive “attack networks” guidelines with $ 5,000 rewards for testing the network.
Attackers will help finalize each client’s specifications, written in different programming languages, before launch.
Eth 2.0 developers have pushed for a multi-tenant version of the project due to lessons learned from the current Ethereum network. The original network was released with a few implementations, but was dominated by only one, Geth. Developers are taking their time as some customers might have bugs, a situation that will hopefully be resolved by testing and attack networks.
“Based on the current progress of the different teams, I assume it will replace Altona and be live in early September,” Quantstamp CEO Richard Ma said in a private message. “That allows three months of final testing before launch. Medal is the final pre-launch network ”.
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Update (July 22, 22:00 UTC): Ethereum launched with more than one client, as stated earlier in the article. The information has been updated.
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