I’m pleased to announce we’ve now deployed the updated ENS auction registrar on the Ropsten testnet. This replaces the original registrar. You can try out the updated registrar on Ropsten by following the documentation at docs.ens.domains.

Note: If you already have a .eth name on Ropsten, you’ll need to register it again.

Progress since first launch attempt

Following March’s abortive launch, we’ve made a number of improvements to both the process and our code, outlined in the launch postmortem:

An extensive new set of unit tests

Two audits were conducted. The audit results are here.

We’ve fixed the issues identified by the launch. Those identified by the audits. We’ve also made a few other small changes to improve overall robustness.

The interface is improved. Opening and bidding on an auction can now be only a single transaction, instead of two separate ones.

We’ve launched a bug bounty.

We’ve also made a significant change to the launch process.

In the initial launch, all names became available for bidding immediately. The auction period was initially set to 4 weeks, with durations reducing to 1 week after launch.

This was intended to give people plenty of time to become aware of ENS and bid on any auctions that interested them at the start. It also has the potential to lead to a big landrush on Day 1, with all auctions ending at the same time.

For the relaunch, we’re using a different system. All auctions will run for 3 days, followed by a 2 day reveal period. The launch dates for each name will be staggered out over an extended period — currently 13 weeks.

So while some names will be available almost immediately after launch, others will take days or weeks to become available. We hope this launch schedule will provide for a ‘softer’ launch.

A softer launch should provide us with more time to react to and resolve any issues. It will also make sure that popular names get the attention they deserve when they come up for auction.

The time when a name becomes available during the launch period is pseudorandom (It’s determined based on its sha3 hash, for those who are curious.)

Before the mainnet relaunch, the registrar DApp will be updated with functionality to let you check when a name first becomes available for auction. The DApp update will be announced via a post in this Medium publication and on the ENS Gitter channel.

Conclusion

We hope you’re looking forward to the relaunch as much as we are. In the meantime, you can try out the updated registrar on Ropsten by following the documentation at docs.ens.domains.

Note that for testing purposes, the ‘soft launch’ period on Ropsten is much shorter than it will be on mainnet — just 4 weeks.