'Solstice' Approaching: Mimblewimble Blockchain Considers Fork Schedule

A soon-to-be-launched cryptocurrency based on an acclaimed white paper is considering a novel strategy for future blockchain upgrades.

In a mailing list update this week, Igno Peverell, the pseudonymous lead of the MimbleWimble project, stated the developer team is exploring how it could program in consistent changes as a buffer against faulty code. The statements come amidst a larger debate on how public blockchain networks should pursue updates, given this process can have disruptive complications.

Possible issues aside, though, Peverall believes these upgrades could "clean up" the nascent blockchain and allow for the correction of any flaws.

Peverell writes:

"As we're preparing both a fully new blockchain format and implementation we, developers, are bound to make mistakes. Some of them will be trivial to correct, and some of them will not, requiring changes in consensus parameters."

Peverell suggests that every six months, MimbleWimble will "hard fork" or swap to a new blockchain, a schedule that could occur for the first two years of the project.

In response, contributor Casey Rodarmor agreed to the proposal, and using project-specific atmospherics, suggested the upgrades could align with the summer and winter solstices. "The betas would then be available on the equinox prior," Rodarmor suggested.

Infused with Harry Potter references from the start (the term "MimbleWimble" comes from a spell detailed in the popular book series), the project, which aims to roll out a network in the coming months, has been heralded as a solution to privacy and scalability issues facing blockchains.

Another mailing list contributor, Andrew Bellenie, suggested not to limit the hard forks to the first two-year period, but rather, to schedule them as ongoing upgrades in a way that mimics monero's current strategy. Still, there are signs other factors could come into play in any decision making.

He added: "I like the solstice idea too, for entirely non-technical reasons."

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