The OriginTrail Vostok Mainnet has been up and running for almost 100 days now! We are happy to see many community members running nodes, engaging with the community on Discord, and giving valuable feedback on the code. OriginTrail’s development team is observing findings from functional telemetry, statistics, and community feedback.

Today, we released an important update to the mainnet node. If you are running a node on the OriginTrail Vostok Mainnet, please read the information below carefully, as you will be required to take certain steps to keep your node active on the network.

What Does the v2.0.50 Release Bring?

Apart from several small improvements and patches for issues discovered during network operation, the team has focused on two main improvements to node operation.

The first important improvement is adding additional support for node connectivity with Ethereum, lowering the dependency on RPC services like Infura’s API. The node supports utilizing any exposed RPC service, though for auto installations (via Docker), the previously default setting was to use a predefined Infura RPC endpoint and key for interfacing with the Ethereum network. As of version 2.0.50, the OT node now explicitly requires users to input their preferred RPC endpoint, be it Infura with a user-provided API key, or direct communication to, for example, a Geth node. Therefore, please keep in mind that following the update, you will need to provide these details before the node can become operational again. More information is available in the official node documentation. If you wish to continue using Infura as your Ethereum RPC provider for the OT node, please be mindful of the upcoming Infura upgrades and announcements.

The second major update is an enhancement in the replication solution mining algorithm, which was designed to improve the bidding mechanism on the mainnet. As previously observed, the bidding mechanism in version 2.0.44 produced an irregular distribution of the jobs on the network for several reasons. The two main reasons are 1) the fact that the solution space for the mining algorithm was biased towards replication request responsiveness and 2) traversal of solution space on lower difficulties has been biased towards higher values of identities, even though the smart contract provided a random problem that ensures a high degree of randomness from the start. The network size and growth also play a role as they influence the difficulty of the smart-contract-generated task, which, when increased (with network growth), would significantly downsize the issue, a behaviour that has been observed in the team’s internal tests and simulations.

Distribution of jobs through identity address space using the old mechanism for traversing solution space.

In version 2.0.50, the team has implemented an improved mechanism that significantly changes the distribution, as can be seen on the graph below (results and statistics originated in the team’s internal testing environment). This change in the smart contract task enforces further randomization, even at lower difficulties of solution mining, and removes the possibility of bias in the DC mining algorithm, as it is no longer dependent on replication request responsiveness nor biased towards higher or lower values of identities.

Distribution of jobs through identity address space using the new improved mechanism for traversing solution space.

When Should You Update Your Node?

The update to v2.0.50 is a transitional update (due to the lowered Infura dependency and the updated bidding mechanism), therefore, if you are running a node on the OriginTrail Vostok Mainnet, you should make an effort to update to the new version sooner rather than later, as you may lose the opportunity to acquire jobs as DC nodes move to the new version. To update your node, please follow the instructions you have received via email, our official documentation, and the team announcements in our Discord community.

What Else Is in Store?

The development team has been focused on developing, simulating, and testing the next major protocol update, ahead of the Freedom stage of the mainnet, which will include litigation mechanisms that add further resilience to the data in the network. The next version will be version 3 of the protocol and will see its initial deployment in the near future on the OriginTrail Testnet.

More updates from the OriginTrail development team are coming soon. Stay tuned!

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