Ethereum’s big moment is approaching and everything is on schedule… for now.
Let's talk shadow forks and testnet hard forks.
(Sounds made up, right?).
Think of it like this:
If Ethereum's big ol' efficiency upgrade (known as 'The Merge') were a stage show, shadow forks would be line rehearsals for a particular scene and testnet hard forks would be full dress rehearsals.
Shadow forks are trial runs of specific features - designed to pressure test parts of the show, but not the whole thing.
Testnet hard forks trial everything, from start to finish, to an empty theatre - so if anything goes wrong, they can fix it before the public see it.
Here's the proposed timeline from yesterday, until launch:
(Jul 27) The Ethereum Network ran through its tenth shadow fork (line rehearsal)
(Aug 11) The final testnet hard fork (dress rehearsal) is scheduled to take place.
(Sep 19th) 'The Merge' (opening night) happens.
...and the Ethereum community are all VERY excited.
Why? Because it looks like everything is finally running to schedule, after years of delay.
As of September 19th, the Ethereum network will:
Require way less energy to run (a 99% reduction).
Allow users to earn interest on their ETH holdings.
Theoretically be able to outpace the likes of Visa and Mastercard in transactions per second.
(Touch wood it all goes to plan).