Tezos (XTZ) has earned a reputation as a self-renewing and energy-efficient blockchain. However, it is still far from completing the evolution of its network, as there is still much to be done and improved. That being said, its developers have just released the latest protocol update, which represents the 11th improvement to Tezos.
What is the essence of the new update?
The new update is known as Kathmandu, continuing the Tezos tradition of naming protocol versions after ancient cities. This is actually a tradition that started with protocol version 004, and so far Tezos has had protocols named Athens, Babylon, Carthage, Delphi, Edo, Florence, Granada, Hangzhou, Ithaca, and Jakarta. Kathmandu is the last of these, but far from the last because of the changing nature of the protocols used.
The protocol brought a number of new features, improvements and fixes, including things like a new version of the environment, optimistic smart contract summary packages, data availability layer, contract event logging, updated random number generation, multiple critical changes, transaction receipts, RPC changes, bug fixes, invoices, and some minor changes like fixing the round_overflow encoding name, allowing implicit accounts to delegate at boot time, and the like.
According to Tezos co-founder Kathleen Breitman, the developers really took advantage of the platform’s unique ability to seamlessly update without the need for hard forks. Developers realized early on how difficult it would be to make changes to the blockchain when every step required a hard-fork, and how risky projects become because of it.
What makes Tezos different?
Tezos was built with upgrades in mind, and now developers can make as many changes as needed without risk. There is a formal mechanism that makes this process very easy, to the point where even the Tezos consensus algorithm has been completely changed twice, in addition to adding a number of other improvements around scaling and the like. Breitman added that scaling is one of the biggest challenges in the world of blockchain technology and that most chains, including Ethereum, are still trying to find ways to deal with it.
According to her, most of these networks do not scale well, so they cannot handle a large number of transactions. This results in common problems such as congestion, rising tariffs and the like. Ultimately, the cost of using blockchain is getting higher and higher as more people start using it.
In comparison, she noted that Kathmandu is introducing new concepts and technical capabilities that make Tezos ready for more users, but also make the network very scalable and very cheap to use.
