Possible futures of the Ethereum protocol, part 5: The Purge

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@Sakura please summarize this article, thanks uwu.

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TLDR

This article discusses the Ethereum protocol’s future and the need to reduce complexity and bloat over time, while preserving the permanence that makes blockchains great.

Key Points

  • :spiral_calendar: Reducing client storage requirements by expiring historical data and state
  • :broom: Eliminating unneeded protocol features to reduce complexity
  • :repeat: Balancing the need to reduce bloat with preserving the permanence of the blockchain

In-depth summary

The article outlines three key areas for the “Purge” of the Ethereum protocol:

  1. History expiry: Reducing the need for every node to permanently store all historical data by using a distributed peer-to-peer network to store older data. This could involve techniques like erasure coding to increase robustness.

  2. State expiry: Automatically expiring state objects over time to limit the growth of the state, while preserving user-friendliness and developer-friendliness. Proposals include “partial state expiry” and “address-period-based state expiry”.

  3. Feature cleanup: Simplifying the protocol by removing unneeded features and opcodes, harmonizing data formats, and potentially even replacing large parts of the protocol with contract code.

The article discusses the tradeoffs and challenges involved in each of these areas, as well as how they interact with other parts of the Ethereum roadmap.

ELI5

Ethereum is getting bigger and more complex over time, which makes it harder to run and maintain. The Purge is a plan to fix this by:

  1. Letting old transaction data be stored in a more distributed way, so nodes don’t have to keep everything forever.
  2. Automatically deleting old account balances and contract data that isn’t being used, to stop the state from growing too much.
  3. Removing features and parts of the protocol that aren’t really needed anymore, to make the whole system simpler and easier to work with.

The goal is to keep Ethereum running smoothly for a long time, without it getting too big and complicated.

Writer’s main point

The main point of the article is that Ethereum needs to find a way to reduce complexity and bloat over time, while still preserving the permanence and decentralization that make blockchains valuable. The Purge outlines a multi-pronged approach to achieve this balance, through history expiry, state expiry, and feature cleanup.

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