Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin spoke about a method to accelerate transactions in the blockchain using technologies that could potentially reduce the confirmation time in L1 from a few seconds to milliseconds.
In a new essay, he proposed moving from the current mechanism of epochs and slots to a single-slot finalization system (SSF), pointing out the key problems associated with the current model.
According to Buterin, The Merge hard fork, which ensured Ethereum's transition from the PoW consensus mechanism to PoS, reduced the transaction confirmation time on the main network to 5-20 seconds.
This indicator "competes with the experience of paying with a credit card," but there is potential for further acceleration of operations, the developer believes.
One of the options for increasing bandwidth may be to change the architecture of slots and epochs.
Slots represent a 12-second period when a randomly selected validator has the right to include a block in the network. Every 32 slots form one epoch.
According to Buterin, the Ethereum Foundation is becoming "increasingly uncomfortable" due to the current slot voting mechanism and the finalizing approach. Such a system is prone to many errors and is extremely inconvenient.
He noted that with such an infrastructure, the final creation of a block takes too long — about 12 minutes. To mitigate the problem, the programmer suggested replacing the existing model with SSF.
"The main difference from Tendermint is that we retain the "idle leak" mechanism, which allows the blockchain to continue working and recover if more than 1/3 of the validators fail," Buterin clarified.
The SSF is still not fully developed and risks encountering some problems. For example, validators need to publish two messages every 12 seconds, which increases network congestion.
To solve such difficulties, the Orbit SSF proposal is being developed, but it is still at an early stage.
"The more opportunities we have, the more useful it is for L1 and L2 users, and the more we can simplify the work of network developers to scale," summed up the co—founder of Ethereum.
Earlier, Buterin listed ways to use cryptocurrencies in everyday life. In particular, he suggested using ZKP mechanisms to verify "identity, credentials or reputation."
Recall that in May, the developer named five architectural solutions of the Ethereum blockchain, which he would like to change if possible.