Apart from the year 2022 being remembered as the year filled with various reasons that the crypto market crashed, and the FTX fiasco, it is also going to be the year that the most awaited Ethereum Merge finally took place; that helped the Ethereum Network to transition from its previously Proof of Work consensus mechanism to the much more energy efficient Proof of Stake consensus mechanism. Taking a step ahead in the next steps that are set for the network to go through, the Shanghai upgrade that is set to be released by mid 2023 will also be coming with the release of Staked Ether being able to be withdrawn from the network!
ETHEREUM SHANGHAI UPGRADE: EXPLAINED
Very simply, Ethereum Shanghai Upgrade is set to introduce a bunch of critical updates and elemental changes to Ethereum in the blockchain’s EVM functionalities. Prior to the actual release, the Ethereum Foundation released on 14 October 2022 a pre-Shanghai testnet for the same. This testnet, also known as ‘Shandong’ will be used to test and finalize the Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) that are expected to be rolled out in the actual Shanghai Update.
According to the CoinDesk report, on Thursday, the Ethereum developers had made a note the network’s next hard fork, which is being termed “Shanghai,” is being targetted to have a release time frame of March 2023. The next step in the Ethereum networks’ development will also comprise of the proposed code known as EIP 4895 which will allow the Beacon Chain staked ether (ETH) withdrawals for the stakers!
Apart from the inclusion of the Staked Ether proposal, the ethereum developers will also look into addressing the implementation of the “EVM Object Format” (EOF) in the Shanghai upgrade. The EOF is basically a collection of EIPs that will effectively upgrade the Ethereum Virtual Machine. This proposal us set to give the environment where Ethereum is able to execute smart contracts a little upgrade. The collective Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) are EIP 3540, EIP 3670, EIP 4200, EIP 4570, and EIP 5450.
