STEEM EVM Update: Post-Upgrade Stability at 255K Blocks & Final Validator Rewards

blaze.apps (74)verified developerin Steem Dev • 4 days ago

Note: Upvoting and resteeming this post directly motivates me to continue building and improving the Steem Virtual Machine ecosystem. Your support is greatly appreciated!

The Steem Virtual Machine (SVM) has successfully stabilized following the v0.0.2-Beta1 upgrade. We have now crossed 255,000 blocks, confirming that the new binary is performing optimally and the network is fully operational.

This milestone proves that our on-chain governance and automated upgrade mechanisms are robust, paving the way for a smooth transition to mainnet in the future.

Previous Updates

✅ Upgrade Success: v0.0.2-Beta1 Live

The SteemVM EVM chain (chain ID 8163) has successfully completed its first on-chain governance upgrade. The upgrade was proposed, voted on, and executed entirely on-chain — no manual coordination beyond validators running the new binary at the halt height.

As of this post, the network is healthy and producing blocks. Anyone can verify:

# current height & network
curl -s https://steemvmd.steemscanner.com/status \
  | grep -oE '"(latest_block_height|network|catching_up)":("?[^",}]*"?)'

# the new bridge gateway, set by governance
curl -s https://reststeemvmd.steemscanner.com/steemvm/steembridge/v1/params

# EVM chain id (expect 0x1fe3 = 8163)
curl -s -X POST https://evmd.steemscanner.com:8545 -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  --data '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"eth_chainId","params":[],"id":1}'

Live snapshot at publish time:

Block height: 255,000+ (upgrade applied entering block 254,133)
Active validators: 5 securing voting power (more unjailing soon)
Bridge gateway: svm.bank — bridge_enabled: true, name_service_enabled: true
Confirmation threshold: 2/3 of bonded power

🔧 What changed in v0.0.2-Beta1

Bridge gateway moved to svm.bank (via governance): The bridge deposit/name-registration account is now the on-chain svm.bank account. Both bridge deposits and name registrations are received here and routed by memo.
Redundant attestations no longer fail: When multiple validators attest the same Steem deposit or registration, the extra attestations are now a harmless no-op instead of failing the transaction.
Relayer only attests supported memos: The relayer now attests only transfers whose memo resolves to a destination (svm-deposit, svm-register, or direct addresses). Random-memo transfers are ignored.
IBC tokens automatically become ERC20: Thanks to the wired-in ERC20 IBC middleware, any token that arrives over IBC is instantly usable as an ERC20 inside the EVM.
Withdrawals simplified: Withdrawal records now use a single clear status, WITHDRAWAL_STATUS_REQUESTED.
Testnet symbol handling: The relayer is now configurable for the Steem testnet (where STEEM appears as TESTS and SBD as TBD) while presenting them cleanly on SteemVM.
Deterministic versioning + upgrade handler: The binary now reports a fixed v0.0.2-Beta1 version, ensuring future upgrades are coordinated cleanly.

Network Health: Post-Upgrade Metrics

The chain is healthy, producing blocks consistently with low latency.

Current Network Stats:

Total Blocks Produced: 255,000+
Total Transactions: 1,033
Registered Addresses: 81
Average Daily Transactions: ~14

🛡️ Call to Action: Unjail Your Validators

Following the upgrade at block 254,132, several validators who did not update their binaries in time were temporarily jailed for downtime. This is a standard safety mechanism and does not result in permanent slashing or loss of rewards eligibility.

I am specifically calling on the following validators to update their nodes and unjail immediately to help restore full decentralization and secure the network:

Steps to Recover:

cd <your-SteemVM-repo>
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/blazeapps007/SteemVirtualMachine-EVM/main/scripts/migrate-config.sh | bash
docker compose down && docker compose up -d
# wait until catching_up:false, then:
docker compose exec steemvm /root/go/bin/steemvmd tx slashing unjail \
  --from <YOUR_KEY> --chain-id steemvm --keyring-backend test \
  --gas auto --gas-adjustment 1.5 --gas-prices 1000000000asteem -y

Detailed instructions are also available in our Discord channel. Please act quickly to ensure you remain part of the active set before the final reward snapshot.

📢 Tomorrow: 5M SHERPA Validator Rewards Announcement

As promised, I will be publishing the final details regarding the 5,000,000 SHERPA genesis reward distribution tomorrow.

This post will include:

The confirmed list of the 12 eligible validators who joined prior to the August 4th deadline.
The exact token allocation for each validator.
Details on how and when these tokens will be distributed upon the transition to the Live Public Network.

Stay tuned for this important announcement!

Current Eligible Validator Set (12 Nodes)

Thank you to all our validators for their dedication during this critical upgrade phase:

How to Connect & Participate

To start interacting with the upgraded SVM:

Network Name: Steem Virtual Machine (SVM)
RPC URL: https://evm.blazeapps.org
Chain ID: 8163
Currency Symbol: STEEM
Explorer: https://evmscan.steemscanner.com
SVM App: https://svmapp.blazeapps.org
Discord: https://discord.gg/xAtjgbm8Tr

Community Engagement

Validators: If you are jailed, please unjail ASAP to help secure the network.
Test the New Bridge: Try sending assets to svm.bank to test the improved relayer logic.
Witness Support: Your vote supports the ongoing development and infrastructure costs of the SVM.

If you value proactive engineering, UX polish, and performance optimizations for the STEEM ecosystem, please consider supporting my witness: blaze.apps

Vote for blaze.apps Witness

#svm #steemvm #steemevm #sherpaprotocol #steemdevelopment

4 days ago in Steem Dev by blaze.apps (74)verified developer

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