Celestia's Lemongrass Upgrade: A Comprehensive Overview

A significant milestone is on the horizon for Celestia, as the blockchain platform prepares for its first major upgrade, dubbed 'Lemongrass'. According to the Celestia Blog, this upgrade brings numerous consensus layer changes aimed at enhancing the platform's functionality and performance.

Key Features of the Lemongrass Upgrade

The Lemongrass upgrade introduces several critical changes, including Interchain Accounts, Packet Forward Middleware, and CIP-10, a mechanism designed to streamline future upgrades. The release of version 2.0.0 of the celestia-app will trigger the activation of Lemongrass on the Arabica Devnet in August 2024. Following successful testing, the Mocha Testnet is also expected to be upgraded later in August, with the Celestia Mainnet Beta set to receive the upgrade by early to mid-September.

Changes to the Data Availability Layer

The Data Availability (DA) layer will also undergo significant technical changes in coordination with the community. These include pruning blob data (CIP-4) and the introduction of Shwap (CIP-19), a new messaging framework for DA and sampling. Detailed information on these changes can be found in the respective CIPs.

Detailed Breakdown of Core Improvement Proposals (CIPs)

The Lemongrass hardfork encompasses several Core Improvement Proposals (CIPs) as outlined in CIP-17. These include:

• CIP-6: Price enforcement.
• CIP-9: Packet Forward Middleware.
• CIP-10: Coordinated Upgrades.
• CIP-14: Interchain Accounts.
• CIP-20: Disable Blobstream module.

CIP-6: Price Enforcement

CIP-6 introduces a mechanism to enforce a minimum gas price for transactions on the network, aimed at minimizing spam and ensuring efficient network operation.

CIP-9: Packet Forward Middleware

CIP-9 brings Packet Forward Middleware (PFM) to the network, enabling IBC multi-hop and facilitating the forwarding of data packets. This is designed to reduce latency and overhead in bridging operations.

CIP-10: Coordinated Upgrades

CIP-10 introduces an in-protocol signaling mechanism for validators to signal readiness for a hardfork upgrade. When a quorum of 5/6 of network stake is reached, the network migrates to the new version, ensuring faster and simpler upgrade processes.

CIP-14: Interchain Accounts

CIP-14 introduces Interchain Accounts (ICA), allowing accounts on the Celestia network to be controlled by accounts on another chain via IBC, enhancing interoperability between Celestia and IBC-enabled chains.

CIP-20: Disable Blobstream Module

CIP-20 disables the Blobstream module in Celestia’s consensus layer, simplifying the network architecture and improving performance. The module is deprecated in favor of zk-light clients being developed by the core developer community.

This upgrade marks a pivotal moment for Celestia, setting the stage for enhanced interoperability, efficiency, and future scalability of the network.

For more detailed information, visit the Celestia Blog.