After several delays and some hiccups, Cardano’s long-awaited Vasyl update finally went live on September 22nd. From the outside in, the hard fork is designed to improve the ecosystem’s efficiency and overall transaction flow capacity, as well as advance Cardano’s decentralized applications. (DApps) growth potential.
b remember In the event, there was an announcement from the blockchain firm Input Output Hong Kong (IOHK) – which currently oversees the design, construction and maintenance of the Cardano platform – a few minutes after its development.
To get a more comprehensive look at what the update represents and its impact on Cardano (as well as the entire crypto ecosystem), Cointelegraph caught up with COTI CEO Shahaf Bar-Jeffen, a protocol for creating decentralized payment networks and stablecoins. . In his view:
“Vasil’s upgrade heralds the dawn of a new era for the Cardano ecosystem and the decentralized financial space as a whole. The update aims to improve the scalability of the network and enhance Cardano’s smart contract capabilities.
Bar-Jeffen also stated that the hard fork will increase the number of transactions on the DJD algorithm stable coin jointly developed by IOHK and the COTI team, thereby helping Cardano become a major competitor. Stable coin transactions.
Take a closer look at what Vasil has to offer
Before looking at the practical and functional benefits provided by the Vasil Hard Fork, it would be better to understand what exactly a hard fork is. In its basic definition, a hard fork is a network modification in motion when the people who manage the blockchain platform decide to add or adjust certain features to the ecosystem.
In other words, when a hard fork occurs, the network splits into two versions that run separately, one version following the existing features and rules while the other continues as an improved version of the network.
Explaining her perspective on the technical aspects of the update, BiBit’s head of crypto insights, Charmin Ho, told Cointelegraph that Cardano’s Vasyl hard fork at the application layer aims to strengthen the network’s current smart contracts for a better experience for both. Users and developers alike, adding:
“This leads to a more efficient build process for applications on the chain at the same time. At the infrastructure level, many of the improvements that come with the Vasyl hard fork allow Cardano to increase its block size and TPS while maintaining its POS architecture.”
Ho went on to explain that Vasil’s hard fork is aimed not only at improving the scale of the chain and improving existing features, but also at strengthening the stability and connectivity of the network. “This is a big and popular step for Cardano, as this update is expected to increase the transaction speed and reduce the transaction costs of the network,” she added.
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Finally, it’s worth noting that Vasyl is not Cardano’s first major network update, as a year ago the project saw the launch of another hard fork called Alonzo, which was designed to allow users to run DApps using smart contracts. Along with many other developments, Alonzo’s update was a way to provide users with an attractive alternative to using smart contracts as another platform to develop seamless novel applications.
Why is Vasil so important?
In the year Named after Vasyl St. Dabov, a prominent member of the Cardano community who passed away in 2021, the update will increase the ecosystem’s transaction flow, efficiency and latency. In addition, the hard fork implements a method called distribution pipelining, which aims to improve distribution times by increasing the network’s transaction processing capacity.
Vasil’s hard fork introduces three key Cardano Improvement Proposals (CIPs), namely CIP-31, CIP-32, and CIP-33. In this regard, CIP-31 introduces a new reference input method that allows DApps to access transaction output data without having to recreate it as before, making the whole process much more streamlined and time-saving. At the same time, CIP-32 is designed to improve Cardano’s native level of decentralization by introducing an on-chain data storage feature for network participants.
CIP-33 makes changes to the system’s native programming script to simplify transactions for faster processing and reduced fees. Finally, another modification called CIP-40 is introduced as part of Vasyl. It introduces a new result trading method to improve block distribution without full verification.
Other improvements include the addition of Plutus, Cardano’s native smart contract programming language, which is now more functionally advanced than its previous iteration. Not only that, Vasil improves the security of the platform by simplifying the interface with Cardano’s UTXO model (designed to mimic Bitcoin) while keeping the transaction load off-chain.
Possible effects on the ADA
The first round of hard forks started on September 22nd, and the rest of the updates will take effect on September 27th. To this point, the second phase of the hard fork seeks to redefine the direct Plutus price model. It affects the processing power and memory charges required to manage Cardano’s native smart contracts.
In addition to Vasyl’s update, the Cardano team has been working tirelessly on the development of a Layer-2 scaling solution – the Hydra Head protocol – that will allow transactions to be processed from the Cardano blockchain. Its main security and settlement layer.
To this point, a recent update by the Cardano team has successfully resolved a known issue with Hydra’s node framework. As things stand, the protocol does not have a specific release date. However, the IOHK Group has hinted that the supply could enter the market by the end of 2022 or the first quarter of 2023.
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Vasil was slated to go live earlier this year, but faced several obstacles. Although the update is now live, the ecosystem continues to recover from the effects of these delays. For example, since early 2020, Cardano’s native cryptocurrency, ADA, has continued to witness a dip in transaction volume. Not only that, but from a price performance standpoint, the update didn’t do much in terms of boosting ADA value, with the currency trading less than 1% for the week.
Although ADA’s price action remains elusive, the fact that the Cardano ecosystem has made such impressive strides over the past year shows that the project is poised for big things in the medium term.