The Solana ecosystem takes into account SIMD-0326 Alpenglow, an upgrade to the consensus in order to redefine the network speed and the scaling to 150ms block finality.
The SIMD-0326 Alpenglow proposal, which suggests upgrading the network to 150ms block finality, is the most visible proposal to have made it to the voting phase in Solana history. The vote runs from epoch 840 to 842.
Source – X
Alpenglow will transform speed and finality at Solana.
This upgrade will decrease the time needed to confirm a block, reducing block confirmation time to approximately 150 milliseconds. This dramatic reduction pushes Solana toward near-instant finality, a game-changer for decentralized applications.
In the proposal, the current Proof-of-History and TowerBFT consensus mechanisms are replaced by a new architecture that revolves around Votor, a direct off-chain vote system.
Validators may vote Yes, No, or Abstain, and two-thirds of them must vote to pass. It must also have a quorum of 33 percent, inclusive of abstentions. Off-chain voting and cryptographic signature aggregation decrease the network load significantly.
This upgrade will also present a new streamlined block propagation system, called Rotor, as opposed to the current multi-layered Turbine approach.
Voting dynamics and community sentiment ignite interest
Source – dune.com
Currently, 37 validators, which account for six percent of the stake, have cast their votes. The governance period spans three epochs. Participation of the validator and the integrity of votes are sensitive because false or absent votes can result in fines.
The market response to the advance of the proposal is already apparent; Solana (SOL) has recently traded at about 210 dollars with a 7.83 percent increase in a single day, despite the other rejections made previously in the 176 and 207 range.
There is a positive reception for the upgrade in some quarters as a necessary part of scalability, so that there is a thriving application between high-frequency trading and payment systems.
Others complain of possible obstacles that are posed by the fee to the Validator Admission Ticket of 1.6 SOL per epoch, which is burned to inhibit inflation but may constrain smaller operators.
Should this be passed, Alpenglow will massively increase the resilience of the network. It has the ability to tolerate 20 percent of adversarial and 20 percent of unresponsive validators without the deceleration of progress. This resiliency is incomparable to that of the current system, as it will result in a safer and more effective Solana.
The result of the vote would determine the future capabilities and competitiveness of Solana in the blockchain space.