Original Author: Haotian

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"Vitalik Designated Route Epoch and slot: Providing Faster Transaction Confirmation Time for Ethereum"

How to understand @VitalikButerin's thoughts on Ethereum transaction confirmation method? Because the mainnet's 5-20s transaction confirmation time is approaching the speed of credit card consumption level, it seems sufficient from the user's perception. However, compared to the millisecond-level confirmation time of layer 2, there will be certain security risks in the transaction confirmation difference between the mainnet and layer 2. Therefore, optimizing the mainnet transaction confirmation time is more in line with the strategic consideration of embracing the development of layer 2.

1. The current Gasper consensus mechanism of Ethereum adopts the core concepts of Slot and Epoch. Each Slot lasts for 12 s, during which a portion of Validators are selected to validate the current transaction state of the chain and vote. Every 32 Slots, or 6.4 min, form an Epoch, within which almost all validators complete the voting process. Transaction finality typically requires two Epochs, or 12.8 minutes, which means that a transaction initiated will only possess irreversible characteristics after 12.8 minutes.

2）Vitalik believes that the time is too long, and is dissatisfied with the current Gasper consensus mechanism, proposing the Single-slot finality improvement method, which can ensure that each block completes finality confirmation before the next block is generated, thereby accelerating the finality confirmation time. However, finality confirmation and transaction confirmation are two different things, which are not closely related to the 5-20s transaction confirmation perceived by users, but it will be a big problem when corresponding to layer 2 networks.

3. Because layer 2 users submit and confirm transactions in a shorter time, which is not only better than the user perception time of 5-20 seconds, but may reach the millisecond level. This is due to the pre-transaction confirmation mechanism adopted by layer 2 as a whole. However, if the transaction finalization confirmation time of layer 1 mainnet is too long, there will theoretically be some time difference risks on layer 2: For example, users may quickly confirm and take subsequent actions on L1, but they may suffer from fund losses due to the lagging status confirmation of L1; moreover, since layer 2 itself has some centralization risks, longer time differences may pose potential unknown risks of centralization chaos.

4. Therefore, in my opinion, Vitalik's new article on the optimization of transaction confirmation time on the Ethereum mainnet is to some extent to cater to the grand strategy jointly promoted by the layer 2 system and layer 1 system. Although some people in the market are speaking ill of layer 2, it has become a direction that must be stabilized in the development process of Ethereum.

Clearly, Ethereum's future will undoubtedly be driven by a 'layered' strategy, focusing on security and decentralization at layer 1, while providing a stable and reliable interactive settlement environment at layer 2, which is the general trend. Vitalik proposed accelerating transaction confirmation, essentially to reduce friction between layer 1 and layer 2, providing users with a better front-end interactive environment at layer 2 and a more secure backend settlement foundation.