Casper Network is a smart contract platform based on Layer 1 and Turing-complete Wasm. It is supported by the only operational CBC-Casper Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm (called Highway). The network is a permissionless, decentralized ized public blockchain.
It has been more than two years since the Casper Network mainnet was launched in April 2021. Although the narrative direction of the encryption industry has continued to change during this period, especially the completion of the ETH 2.0 upgrade, which has further broken the pattern of the public chain track, it is still able to An enterprise-level public chain ecosystem active in the industry. This is inseparable from Casper Labs’ unique understanding of blockchain and its top-notch technical level.
Mrinal Manohar, CEO and co-founder of Casper Labs, previously stated in an interview that Casper allows enterprises and developers to seamlessly integrate blockchain technology into their existing systems and development processes. Many other Layer1 protocols believe that, The complete replacement of the technology stack is to make these systems “blockchain ready” or “blockchain centric”. They believed that replacing the existing system was not feasible. Instead, the software is managed and developed incrementally, and Casper technology provides this without sacrificing security, which is also possible because of the capabilities provided by the Casper blockchain.
At the same time, he also said that any commercial enterprises and projects of any size seeking to use the technology to build applications need to control their on-chain contracts, support their customers, and guarantee that the protocol will continue to adapt and evolve as their needs change. , which reveals the long-term development purpose of the Casper Network ecosystem as an enterprise-level public chain.
In fact, Casper Labs has been making technical updates to Casper Network after the Casper Network mainnet went online, including building and optimizing it from scratch for enterprise and developer adoption.
In August this year, Casper Network once again completed the 1.5 upgrade. This upgrade improved and introduced a series of features, making Casper the only Layer 1 blockchain that can debug real-time, composable smart contracts on the main network.
Casper Association board member Ralf Kubli said after the upgrade was completed: “The 1.5 upgrade is an important milestone in our efforts to create a blockchain environment that fosters innovation and pave the way for sustainable and impactful solutions to real-world challenges. Smooth the road.”
Specific details of Casper Network 1.5 version upgrade
As an enterprise-level blockchain system, Casper Network is currently the best ecosystem for enterprises to manage sensitive data based on blockchain technology. The update to version 1.5 further enhances its unique control functions and makes Casper Network the only A blockchain that implements upgradable smart contracts by design. This new feature is very necessary and important for any company or organization that builds a large-scale management cluster on the blockchain. Thanks to the Casper 1.5 upgrade, the Casper blockchain will be more accessible, more efficient, and more secure than ever before.
From the technical details disclosed by Casper Network, we see that some of the key improvements in its new version include:
Quickly sync nodes
In the Casper 1.5 network, new nodes no longer need to synchronize all the way back to the genesis block in order to participate in the network.
This quick-join feature will significantly reduce the time required to set up a new node compared to previous versions, making launching nodes on the Casper blockchain more efficient than ever before, in addition to saving disk space for node operators .
At the same time, it also introduces more powerful disaster recovery functions to ensure that critical work will not be lost due to any interruption. On the traditional blockchain (currently in the vast majority of Layer1 and Layer2 networks), this is the blockchain One of the most common pain points in deployment, and one of the reasons why most blockchain systems have difficulty serving enterprise users in the long term.
Re-delegate the pledge without unlocking it
Casper Network is a blockchain system with CBC-Casper Proof-of-Stake (POS) as the consensus mechanism, which allows users to entrust tokens to nodes to help the network maintain security and receive rewards. In version 1.5, users can now choose their preferred validator or switch staked tokens from an existing validator to another validator during the unlocking period. Although the unlocking period takes approximately 14-16 hours, the process Will be able to run during the unlocking period and the tokens will be re-delegated after the process is completed, no longer requiring the user to manually unlock.
Multi-signature and role-based security enabled
In the new version, a new feature will enable smart contracts to see which keys signed a transaction.
In addition to operational thresholds and weighted keys, developers now gain an additional layer of security by being able to see who signed past transactions and use those account hashes to configure different account capabilities, which enables Casper Network to implement multi-signatures and Role-based security features. Based on this feature, enterprise user managers will be able to manage funds more comprehensively, which further consolidates Casper Network's position as the most secure and configurable blockchain on the market.
New speculative execution terminal
Developers can now test and debug smart contracts on live networks using real production data.
This approach allows developers to see how a specific application will perform in a real-world environment without relying on a test environment.
This feature is unique to Casper and meets an important need for enterprises and independent developers, allowing them to debug contracts without committing changes to the blockchain. With this feature, developers can confirm when their smart contracts are running and spend consumption as a realistic simulation on a real network environment, which helps support the same software used by organizations in non-blockchain environments. Develop best practices such as CI/CD, etc.
Enhanced smart contract security
Smart contracts now have the option to access a list of authorized keys, which is beneficial for multi-signature contracts and role-based security.
The maximum stack height affects the operation of the contract. The increasing stack in Casper Network can provide more flexibility for smart contracts and have better compatibility with development tools. This will provide developers with more tools and flexibility, ensuring Casper Network can support a wider range of applications and use cases.
Overall, the Casper 1.5 upgrade provides Casper users with a comprehensive upgraded experience, such as a simplified node creation process on the network, key security upgrades, more accurate estimates of future transaction costs, and the ability to re-delegate tokens more efficiently. Crucially, Casper 1.5 also allows contract authors to run transactions against an active blockchain without committing the results. With this upgrade, Casper also becomes the only Layer 1 blockchain capable of debugging real-time, composable smart contracts on the mainnet, providing enterprises with more control and increasing the utility of public blockchain infrastructure.
$25 million Grant Fund
As early as November last year, the Casper Association announced the launch of its new $25 million Casper Accelerate funding program at the opening ceremony of NBX in Berlin. The program is designed to support developers and innovators in building a powerful Casper public around the world. Blockchain. The program is providing funding for projects building applications on the Casper Network to support infrastructure, end-user applications and research innovation on the Casper blockchain.
Grant provides development funding support in many aspects. Currently, projects in testing tools, smart contracts, NFT, Layer3 and many other fields have submitted Grant applications. Many applicants have also received funding and built projects on the Casper network. application.
To support this funding initiative, the Casper Association is also creating a new and innovative Casper Developer Portal. Built to support Casper developers and innovators, the Casper Developer Portal is already live in the first quarter of 2023.
Based on Casper Network's advanced and developer-friendly enterprise-level blockchain bottom layer and the support of the Grant funding plan, the Casper ecosystem has ushered in a more prosperous situation. At present, Casper Network has welcomed hundreds of ecological partners, involving more than a dozen industry fields such as CEX, cross-chain bridges, cloud storage, DeFi, DAO, NFT, and development tools. With the completion of Casper Network 1.5 upgrade, Casper Network will be able to bring more support to developers, and the ecosystem is expected to usher in a new round of explosion in a new round of industry narrative.
Casper Network’s ambition to build an enterprise-level blockchain ecosystem
At present, Web3 is still in the early stages of development. Compared with the Web2 world, there is a huge gap in the number of users and funds. As the industry develops and narrative directions continue to change, the Web3 industry is also exploring in-depth how to organically integrate with the Web2 world. For example, RWA is a new narrative direction with great potential, including Goldman Sachs, Siemens, Hamilton Lane, Many Web2 business giants such as JPMorgan Chase and DBS Bank are actively entering the market, and Web2 companies are also becoming a new link in the development of this trend, which is providing impetus for the industry to develop to the next stage.
But from another perspective, infrastructure facilities such as blockchain public chains are still mainly oriented to Web3 natives and Web3 developers, and lack inclusiveness for Web2 developers. We have seen that whether it is Solana, Avalanche, etc., which are emerging Layer 1s that hope to redefine the blockchain in a new form, or ETH 2.0, which has just completed upgrades and reshaped the public chain field, they lack flexibility in meeting the actual needs of Web2 developers. of. Although blockchain enterprise-level applications are a very clear trend, the development process has always been relatively slow.
It is foreseeable that Web2 companies may become an important role in promoting a new wave of Web3. How to bring these roles more smoothly into the industry is becoming key. In the early days, Casper Network positioned itself as an enterprise-level application and catered to the development needs of Web2 enterprise developers in its early mechanism settings. After the 1.5 upgrade is completed, Casper Network can further develop for Web2 in many aspects. Provide technical support to enterprises and build the foundation for enterprises to establish a new management framework based on blockchain.
With the all-round layout of Casper Labs, Casper Network is becoming the main infrastructure for enterprise users to build applications, and its ambition to build an application ecosystem is also becoming prominent.