Istanbul upgrade is expected to be on Ethereum mainnet around December 5, 2019 at Block # 9,069,000.

In this post we are providing you update about Istanbul based on the discussions at Ethereum All Core Dev calls and ACD Gitter.

Next All core Dev call: Friday, November 29, 2019. Stay tuned!!

(Nov 15, 2019)

• Most of the clients are ready with block number added.
• Harmony J will not be a part of Istanbul. It is discontinuing supporting Eth1.x and would continue to build on Eth 2.0. Anyone interested to maintain the repo may reach the team on EthereumJ Gitter, updated Mikhail Kalinin.
• Ethernode looking for help to get updated.
• Upgrade your node with latest upgrade of respective clients. ~16% of nodes have updated so far.

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(Nov 1, 2019)

• Mainnet upgrade around Dec 05, 2019.
• Block # 9,069,000.

A discussion around EIP Centric upgrade.

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(Oct 25, 2019)

• Mainnet upgrade date: Dec 4, 2019.
• Block number will be decided soon.
• James Hancock is new HF coordinator for Ethereum upgrade.
• EIP 2124: Minor adjustment to be done by Peter (Geth) based on Piper Merriam suggestions and then will proceed.
• Networking protocol is least visited, need more love from community.
• Eth 64 proposal will be open for all.
• James will write a blog on upcoming IceAge.

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(Oct 04, 2019)

Ropsten testnet Report

As reported in Ethereum Core Devs Meeting 72 Notes, Péter Szilágyi provided a summary of what happened in Ropsten Testnet for Istanbul.

"Ropsten fork came 2 days earlier than expected. It was a surprise, but it turn that somebody is mining Ropsten with about 1.5 Giga Hashes. Some of these pushing was really hard. It came a little early that scared us because it looked like the fork failed. Then it turn out that the fork did succeed. The problem was this miner who was pushing with 1.6 Giga Hashes Ropsten, is actually pushing the non forked chain. So we have a huge miner on non Istanbul currently. For past couple of days we've spent trying to figure out what happening in Ropsten because the network currently is really unhealthy. It boils out to the fact that most people did not upgrade yet, so most of the nodes are non-Istanbul nodes. Since there are really heavy non-Istanbul chain, it makes upgraded nodes minority; thats quite annoying to upgrade currently. It did surface a few issues. Currently, what's happening are non upgraded Istanbul nodes are eclipsing the upgraded one."

"Even though Ropsten fork currently was a bit of a shit show there are really no worries that a similar thing might happen for mainnet. " - Péter Szilágyi

Gorli and Rinkeby testnet Report

Gorli and Rinkeby are completly immune to the issue that happened to Ropsten because they are Proof of Authority testnets. In that, only majority chain can progress. So, either you have non upgraded chain or you have an updated Istanbul chain progressing, but you cannot have two concurrent one. The Cat Herders will reach out to the Gorli team for further update.