Background

The Creditcoin Foundation dedicates to build a sustainable ecosystem around the Creditcoin network to accelerate technology development and commercial adoption.

After the launch of the Creditcoin network, we studied how the blockchain runs in the wild. Further, we monitored how the Creditcoin gets traded in the market. The Creditcoin network has been running stably for over 250,000 blocks, and more than 100 node maintainers joined the blockchain. We also witnessed the Creditcoin market price showing support at $0.10 on a decentralized exchange ForkDelta.

From the study, we have learned that the initial mining reward was a lot more than what is needed for network security. A new mining reward algorithm was proposed based on the hash power data and the market price data of not only the Creditcoin but also other blockchains. The new mining algorithm was added to the Creditcoin implementation along with a hard-fork voting algorithm.

To adapt to the real-world usage data of the Creditcoin network, the Creditcoin Foundation will gradually upgrade the underlying protocol and continuously update Creditcoin. The Creditcoin 1.1 hard-fork will be the first upgrade of the Creditcoin network. The hard-fork will serve as a valuable experience for the Creditcoin Foundation and the Creditcoin community. Based on the experience, we will improve the stability of future hard-forks of the Creditcoin network.

Why Do We Need a Hard-Fork?

The Creditcoin Network is a decentralized network. Each node in the network verifies if a new block is compliant with the network standard. If a node thinks a block is not compliant, the node will ignore the block and any blockchain that includes the block.

Since Creditcoin 1.1 update changes the network standard, blocks generated from Creditcoin 1.1 is incompatible with nodes running Creditcoin 1.0 and vice versa. Thus, we need a transition period to reach a consensus among nodes in the Creditcoin network to switch from Creditcoin 1.0 to Creditcoin 1.1 irreversibly.

The Hard-Fork Release Plan

Creditcoin 1.1 is fully implemented and tested on private networks. Creditcoin Foundation will release Creditcoin 1.1 on Github and as Docker images.

Github repo:

https://github.com/gluwa/Creditcoin

Docker Images:

https://hub.docker.com/repository/docker/gluwa/creditcoin-processor
https://hub.docker.com/repository/docker/gluwa/creditcoin-validator
https://hub.docker.com/repository/docker/gluwa/creditcoin-gateway
https://hub.docker.com/repository/docker/gluwa/creditcoin-client

Once Creditcoin 1.1 is released, we will encourage the miners of the Creditcoin network to update their node from Creditcoin 1.0 to Creditcoin 1.1. The update does not require the node to re-sync and we expect the majority of the blockchain to adopt Creditcoin 1.1 before the end of November 2019.

The update only applies to the Creditcoin network users. Gluwa Creditcoin Vesting Token (G-CRE) users are using the Ethereum network and not affected by the hard-fork. We recommend users to keep the running wallet as the latest official release version.

Impact of Not Updating

Once the hard-fork is complete, the Creditcoin network will not allow Creditcoin 1.0 nodes to mine new blocks. Any soft forks created by Creditcoin 1.0 nodes will get ignored by the network and stay unresolved.

Update Process

1. Stop your existing docker containers:

docker-compose -f [path to docker-compose file] down

2. Run the following commands:

docker pull gluwa/creditcoin-client:latest
docker pull gluwa/creditcoin-gateway:latest
docker pull gluwa/creditcoin-validator:latest
docker pull gluwa/creditcoin-processor:latest

3. Start your existing docker containers:

docker-compose -f [path to docker-compose file] up

Will There be a Hard Forks in the Future?

If anyone decides to change the consensus of the Creditcoin network, they may need to create another hard-fork for the network to adopt the change. In such cases, the Creditcoin Foundation expects to follow the hard-fork consensus process introduced by Creditcoin 1.1. Note that the Creditcoin Foundation is not the only entity that can propose a hard-fork to the Creditcoin network.

Creditcoin 1.1 Proposal

Mining Reward

Creditcoin 1.1 switches to a mining reward schedule with a smaller initial reward and a more gradual decay rate.

- Initial Block Reward: 222 Creditcoins → 28 Creditcoins

- Half-Life: 3,153,600 blocks (approximately 6 years) → 2,5000,000 blocks (approximately 4.76 years)

- Decay Rate: 50% → 5%

Learn more about the new mining reward proposal here.

Hard-Fork Consensus

Creditcoin 1.1 adds a hard-fork consensus algorithm to the Creditcoin network. The algorithm can be reused for future hard-forks.

The hard-fork is switched on when 50% of the latest 5,000 blocks or more were 1.1 blocks and the last 100 blocks or more were 1.1 blocks in a row.

Learn more about the hard-fork consensus proposal here.