Part One of Ethereum's Sharding Roadmap Is Nearly Done

Ethereum is getting closer to deploying new technology that would allow the network to scale, its founder said.

"It seems like part one of phase one is getting something like being already done," Vitalik Buterin said in a developer meeting.

The technology, known as sharding, attempts to split the ethereum blockchain's data into more manageable parts. Pointing to an initial spec posted on Github, Buterin said:

"It's theoretically a good spec of what minimal sharding is going to look like."

Ethereum is under pressure to keep up with the rising popularity of the platform, which has led to slower transaction times and high processing fees. The congestion has already led some token-based projects to build atop other blockchains such as Stellar.

Buterin went to state that the next phase of the four-stage scaling proposal will be completed in "a month and a bit," adding that development work will likely circulate on stateless clients, a type of ethereum software that does not need to process the complete history of the platform.

"Then from there we're going to try and shard it into a working test, a kind of test network," the ethereum founder said.

In the meeting, Buterin also reflected on Casper, ethereum's new consensus protocol that is currently in testing.

As detailed by CoinDesk, the test network has been derailed by issues with the software it deploys. However, Buterin said that in spite of hiccups, the core of the project is sound, or as he put it: "the Casper aspect of Casper… is totally successful."

Still, with the code yet to be adapted for use across different ethereum software clients, he acknowledged:

"That's on a bit of a back burner for now."

Vitalik Buterin image via YouTube