• Ethereum developers have begun finalizing the Shanghai upgrade „shadow fork,“ which will serve as a testing environment for the Shanghai upgrade, allowing developers to identify bugs and any potential issues.
• The upcoming Shanghai hard fork is anticipated to occur in March 2023 and will focus on allowing staked withdrawals.
• Statistics from Beaconscan.com show that there are 504,765 validators, as the validator count crossed the 500,000 zone this year.
Ethereum developers have commenced the finalization of the Shanghai upgrade “shadow fork,” a testing environment for the Shanghai upgrade which will enable developers to detect potential bugs and issues. The “shadow fork” launched at approximately 6 a.m. Eastern Time on Monday morning, though there were some initial issues with the config not correctly applied on Geth. Despite the initial hiccup, the chain is now finalizing correctly.
This upgrade is in anticipation of the Shanghai hard fork, which is scheduled to take place in March 2023. This fork will be centered around allowing staked withdrawals, as there are currently 16,167,527 ETH stored within the validator contract which is locked. The Merge, which occurred 130 days ago, transitioned Ethereum from a proof-of-work to a proof-of-stake consensus algorithm.
Statistics from Beaconscan.com illustrate that the validator count has crossed the 500,000 zone this year, currently standing at 504,765 validators. This presents a significant milestone in the world of cryptocurrency and marks the increasing importance of Ethereum in the world of finance. Moving forward, the Ethereum development team will continue to refine the “shadow fork” in order to ensure a smooth transition when the Shanghai hard fork takes place.
