Witnet 2.0 Official Roadmap

Here is the official Witnet 2.0 roadmap, how we plan to implement it, how long it will take, and why it is important

Rokowski

Published in

The Witnet Oracle Blog

5 min readOct 27, 2023

Introduction

Witnet 2.0 is right around the corner and now is a pristine opportunity to announce the official Witnet 2.0 roadmap. This roadmap will guide the community towards the final implementation of Witnet 2.0 and will showcase the plans to get it done. A fundamental roadmap is important to any project, but this one could feel a little different because of Witnet’s already decentralized nature meaning the path forward could be a little strange with TAPI upgrades. In other words, upgrading Witnet is like upgrading Bitcoin; it’s incredibly hard because there are thousands of nodes that all are acting within their own self interests. So long as we align values and incentives, we believe there should be no issues on the path to Witnet 2.0.

Let’s get into it.

Phase 0 — in progress

Phase 0 consisted of a ton of research to get to the bottom of how an oracle might look under a Proof of Stake model. As a layer 1, changes need to happen at the protocol and consensus level. However any change made at this level will affect the dozens of chains Witnet is integrated on and the dozens of protocols that use the oracle for various things. In other words, a change at the protocol level can have drastic and in some cases dire consequences for anything that uses the oracle. We did the research with this in mind of course, modeling various scenarios and situations to ensure that whatever plan we decided to move forward on had a net-positive effect.

Phase 0 looked like this:

Research and assess different Proof of Stake consensus mechanisms, modeled and specific to oracles.
Draft and publish the Witnet Improvement Proposal and make necessary changes.
Begin the codebase changes in witnet-rust.

Phase 1 — next

This is the testnet phase where we begin to put ideas and discussions into code and running hundreds of tests to intentionally break the network. As we will keep harping on, Witnet has more than just a simple Proof of Stake network seeing as how value must be secured across multiple chains with amount staked on the layer 1. We must not only run tests on how to break the Witnet layer 1, but also how to use the Witnet layer 1 to break smart contracts on other networks and how it could be a profitable attack.

Phase 1 is shaping up like this:

Launch one testnet (or more if necessary) to validate the algorithms that were described in the WIP and examine if the new consensus mechanism and other proposed changes will work in a controlled environment.
Attempt to break the network multiple times.
Update the necessary things so that it will work under another test.
Repeat until the system works as intended.
Begin working on a rebrand campaign for the Witnet brand.

Phase 2 — coming in December

Phase 2 is when we officially release the final version of 2.0. This means that anyone can get their hands on it and we are confident that everything works as intended and necessary to hit the ground running. Of course there will still be some things we need to upgrade, fix, and change but that will likely be part of future released like 2.1. This initial release will focus on security above anything else so that we can ensure a stable network that will support protocols and chains using Witnet. Eventually, efficiency and user experience will follow. For this period in time, stability and security are of the utmost importance.

Phase 2 will look like this:

Publicly launch the final 2.0 release, in its entirety, as the path forward for all ecosystem participants.
Encourage all node operators to upgrade to this version.
Nodes will start to signal whether they support 2.0 or not via the Threshold Activation Protocol Improvement (TAPI) mechanism.
Begin working with influencers, marketing outlets, and crypto media organizations to help bring Witnet 2.0 to the world.
Launch Season 4 of the Witnet Advocates Program with a renewed focus on promoting Witnet 2.0.

Phase 3 — beginning in January

This is the phase where staking begins. We will dub this the #RaceToStake and its when node operators can prepare their upgraded nodes for the first Proof of Stake block. It’s worth it to note that we expect to only allow full node operators to stake in the early days, as allowing staking via myWitWallet or Sheikah can have unexpected outcomes and we want to ensure security first and foremost. Finally, nodes will still run the current version of witnet-rust, version 1.6 for an estimated one month.

Phase 3 will focus on this:

Allow staking via the staking transaction once TAPI is passed but continue to run version 1.6 for security.
Begin work on staking via myWitWallet and Sheikah.
Monitor the StakesTracker for the complete picture of how staking is going in this phase.

Phase 4 — February

This is the final phase in the preparation for Witnet 2.0 and once this phase is complete then Witnet has successfully begin producing fully Proof of Stake blocks and data requests. This will be the time to celebrate, but will the knowledge that there is still a lot of work to be done for Witnet 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, etc.

Witnet 2.0 will only be completely activated once there is 200,000,000 $WIT staked (less than 10% of the total supply and around 25–27% of the circulating supply) and a full month has passed since TAPI for 2.0 has been “approved”. This is the final security measure in place to protect the network and ensure a smooth transition.

Conclusion

We have just detailed our plans for the next 4 months for the Witnet network and we expect it to go exceptionally smooth based on what we’re seeing right now. Stay tuned for more information and announcements regarding the progress of 2.0 and check out the 2.0 community call that we did to answer all of the possible questions that came from the community here.

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