Polygon has announced the V0.3.1 hardfork that is scheduled to be deployed on January 17, 2023. It is expected that the hardfork will bring various improvements and upgrades to the Polygon network, such as increased security, scalability, and performance.
What is New in the Hardfork?
- Reducing gas spikes during demand
In order to execute a transaction on the blockchain, a certain amount of gas fee is required. The base fee, also known as the “miner’s fee,” is the minimum fee required for a transaction to be included in a block, and it is set in accordance with the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 1559. However, during periods of high demand, the base fee can experience exponential spikes, which can make it difficult for users with limited resources to access the network. This issue is resolved by increasing the denominator of the base fee from 8 to 16, which can help to flatten the growth curve and make the fee market more stable.
- Chain reorganizations, also known as “reorgs,” occur when the blockchain’s consensus mechanism allows multiple validators to build on different versions of the same block, resulting in different branches of the blockchain. This can cause confusion and lead to double-spending and other issues. This problem is addressed in this fork by decreasing the “sprint length” (currently 64 blocks), which refers to the number of blocks a validator produces in a contiguous sequence on the Bor chain. By decreasing the sprint length, the hard fork will help reduce the frequency and depth of reorgs, and improve transaction finality.
This change will only affect the way validators build blocks, making it harder for reorgs to happen and ensuring that transactions are confirmed more quickly and securely.
Exploring Polygon with Bitquery Explorer
Using Bitquery’s Polygon explorer, developers and blockchain startups can use the blockchain data.
You can use the “Gas Analytics” tab in the explorer to view information such as gas cost over the last few days, average gas price over a period, and the latest smart contract transactions along with the gas cost. This can help you to identify any potential spikes in the gas fee and monitor the overall stability of the network.
Additionally, Bitquery’s explorer provides a user-friendly interface, and also offers a GraphQL IDE which allows developers to programmatically access the data, this can help to automate data analysis and make it easier to integrate Polygon data into their own applications.
What Does the Hardfork Mean for Bitquery Customers?
The V0.3.1 hardfork on Polygon will not affect existing Bitquery customers and their access to the data. Bitquery’s explorer will continue to provide accurate and up-to-date data on the Polygon network, even after the hardfork. The data will be automatically updated to reflect the latest changes and upgrades on the network.
Customers can continue to use the explorer to query and analyze the blockchain data as usual, and will not need to make any changes or adjustments to their existing setup. This ensures that the data is always accurate and reliable, and allows developers and startups to make more informed decisions when building and deploying their projects on the Polygon blockchain.