Understanding the Byzantium Fork
The Byzantium hard fork was a significant upgrade to Ethereum’s blockchain, serving as the fifth major upgrade.
It aimed to enhance the confidentiality, stability, and resilience of Ethereum by implementing nine Ethereum Improvement Protocols (EIPs).
A Crucial Milestone in Blockchain Development
In blockchain development, fundamental modifications to the software protocol are known as “forks.” Soft forks are backward-compatible, meaning the network remains unified as long as most nodes update to the new software.
In contrast, hard forks are incompatible with older software versions, resulting in a split in the blockchain if any node operators fail to update.
The Byzantium hard fork holds great importance in the Ethereum ecosystem.
It was implemented in 2017 as part of the Metropolis upgrade, the third major upgrade according to Ethereum’s official roadmap.
The Impact of the Byzantium Hard Fork
Before the Byzantium hard fork, transactions in the Merkle tree were referenced using a root parameter.
The fork introduced the transaction status communication protocol in consecutive blocks, allowing Ethereum’s network to overcome limitations in parallel processing for faster chain creation.
This upgrade enabled the execution of multiple transactions in a single block, reporting success or failure, leading to faster transaction processing.
The Byzantium development included four native Ethereum contracts designed to reduce the computational power required for implementing zk-SNARKs, which have become a privacy standard for future cryptocurrency transactions.
These contracts ensure that computationally intensive activities are executed directly on the CPU, reducing overall power consumption.