Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has released his series’ highly anticipated sixth installment, “The Future Development of the Ethereum Protocol Part 6: The Splurge.” In a blog post, he outlines his ambitious vision for enhancing performance and user experience during the Ethereum Splurge phase.
According to the founder, this stage aims to “fix everything else” with the blockchain. Each stage, which includes The Merge, The Surge, The Scourge, The Verge, and The Purge, runs concurrently and focuses on a different part of the blockchain.
Buterin stated that The Splurge is mostly focused on Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) developments and “various niche topics.”
He noted that many small but valuable aspects of Ethereum’s protocol design contribute to its success but do not fit nicely into a larger sub-category, which is the purpose of The Splurge.
Buterin targets a high-performance EVM
Vitalik Buterin discussed the key areas of focus that will shape the Ethereum Splurge phase’s roadmap over the next few years. One of the primary goals emphasized is achieving a high-performance, stable “endgame state” for the Ethereum Virtual Machine. This advancement is crucial for supporting increasingly complex decentralised applications (dApps) and ensuring that the Ethereum Splurge phase can effectively address the growing demands of its user base.
Another important goal is providing account abstraction in the protocol. Buterin claimed that if this feature were implemented, it would represent a safer and more user-friendly method for managing accounts, catering to users who may not be technical experts. This could push the Ethereum Splurge phase over the edge and make it more widely used.
Pectra to introduce account abstraction
Ethereum’s next update, titled Pectra, is scheduled for late 2024 or early 2025. According to Buterin, this update will make account abstraction’s “convenience features” available to all users.
Account abstraction means users could use a wallet-like smart contract, significantly increasing the range of ways they could interact with the blockchain. For instance, users will be able to pay transaction fees using ERC-20 tokens instead of being limited to Ether (ETH).
Buterin also proposed the “multidimensional gas” concept to improve Ethereum’s transaction fee economics. This approach involves establishing separate prices and limits for various blockchain resources, which could help mitigate pressure on resource optimisation.
“We have multidimensional gas for execution and blobs today; in principle, we could increase this to more dimensions: calldata, state reads/writes, and state size expansion” said Buterin.
