Release Notes on v4.0.0-alpha
After months of preparation and multiple rounds of revision, v4.0.0-alpha-4-croeseid has been released! Our dev team has been working hard to bring major amazing features to the Crypto.org chain since the first Crypto.org Chain’s v4.0.0 alpha release.
The latest release, v4.0.0-alpha4-croeseid, has been upgraded to Cosmos-SDK v0.45.6, IBC-go v4.0.0-rc0, and go 1.18. In this post, we will explore some of the key features of the v4.0.0-alpha release.
Support for Interchain Accounts
Interchain accounts are now supported in the v4.0.0 alpha release.
Chains on the Cosmos SDK are required to align with certain network standards (known as the Interchain Standards, or “ICS”) and transport layers to allow blockchains to communicate. Interchain Accounts implement the ICS-27 protocol on the Cosmos SDK, and their modules simplify the process of handling different ICS standards for IBC transactions on IBC modules.
The key features of the Interchain Accounts module are that it enables cross-chain account management built on IBC. It allows one chain to create new interchain accounts on other chains, relay the transactions to these interchain accounts, and submit them to the target blockchain, thus controlling these accounts via IBC transactions.
Unlike how traditional accounts have their transactions signed by private keys, Interchain Accounts are instead controlled by separate chains via IBC transactions and implemented as sub-accounts of the interchain accounts module account. To provide more context, one of the main problems that interchain accounts solve is that they allow one blockchain to access the application features of another blockchain (such as staking and swapping tokens). They allow one blockchain to send a transaction to another IBC-based chain to the interchain account first, before interacting with additional modules on the blockchain.
Interchain accounts can fill the role of application-layer interoperability, while the network layer maintains the IBC standards. Users can learn more on the Cosmos Interchain Accounts page.
Support for Fee Middleware Module
IBC-go released a beta version that supports fee middleware for relayer incentivisation. In the v4.0.0-alpha releases, we have integrated IBC Fee middleware for incentivising relayers for IBC transfers. The Fee Middleware module is designed to contribute as an approach to incentivising application packets getting relayed.
The relayer infrastructure ensures the liveness of the Interchain network and it comes with operational costs. The Fee Middleware module is designed to allow ICS29 fee payments in this middleware design, and are built with the assumption that sender chains are the source of incentives. The Fee Middleware module enables addresses to be registered with each party involved in relaying the packet on the source chain. The fees will be paid to each party at the end of each packet lifecycle, and the registration process is automated at the starting point of the relayer infrastructure.
CosmWasm
CosmWasm is a fantastic feature for developers who build on Crypto.org Chain, as one can easily add CosmWasm smart contract support to the chain without changing the existing logic. As a WASM-based Smart Contract module for the Cosmos SDK, CosmWasm is considered as a smart contract platform built for the Cosmos ecosystem. It contains the library that provides all modular code needed for building a smart contract.
There is some ongoing development supporting the latest Cosmos SDK by the Coswasm team, we will continue to keep updated with the CosmWasm team’s development progress and work on bringing it into the Crypto.org Chain accordingly.
Other Updates
Other than the major updates detailed above, security changes implemented include Swagger UI security fixes and an upgraded CodeQL scanning pipeline. Lastly, other changes include the deprecation of the x/supply module, including its CLI and gRPC.
What’s Next
Users interested in learning more can refer to the binary release notes. This is the first step to integrating the features and the Crypto.org team will continue to work on expanding and realising more features and functionalities on the Crypto.org Chain mainnet. Please stay tuned and we will release more details soon!
