DPoPS Mainnet: Release and schedule
By: Paul Bugnot
Tags: Announcements, Dpos, Cryptocurrency, Blockchain

Dear community,

Today, and after a year-long (but needed) testing period, we are glad to announce that the X-Cash public blockchain is ready to move from Proof of Work consensus algorithm to our new and customized: Delegated Proof of Private Stake consensus algorithm.

What is DPoPS?

The DPOPS (standing for Delegated-Proof-of-Private Stake) is a brand new and unique Delegate-Proof-of-Stake consensus integrated into X-Cash, an open-source fork of Monero which has since the beginning of the project brought new innovation to the privacy coin space (notably FlexPrivacy, public & private transactions on the same blockchain, from the same wallet).

Characteristics

The top 50 delegates are elected as block verifiers.

Using a variation of Delegated Byzantine Fault tolerance consensus where 55% consensus must be reached for a new block to be added to the network.

DBFT allows for up to 45% of the elected block verifiers to be faulty. The system will still be able to produce a new block.

Using Verifiable Random Functions (VRF) to select the next block producer in the system. This allows for a random, but a verifiable way of selecting the next block producer.

Staking

The block reward is given to the block verifier responsible of forging the block, and shared with their voters.

Reserve proof-based voting/staking system: the XCASH’s stake always stays in your wallet.

There is no lockup period. The staked XCASH always remain in your wallet and you can use them at any time. However, moving them from your wallet will cancel your entire staking

No need to keep your wallet/computer online if you are staking towards a shared delegate

Voting

The minimum stake to vote for a delegate is 2 million XCASH.

The election process occurs in every block.

New votes will be taken into account at the top of the next hour.

Your current vote will automatically get cancelled if you change your vote to a different delegate.

There are no voting fees. You can cast a new vote or switch your vote as many time as you like.

Blocks

Blocks can be verified from the delegates explorer with a detailed explanation of the block content.

The voting and reserve bytes data is held in a decentralized database system.

The block format is designed to store a hash of the reserve bytes data, pointing to the decentralized database, to reduce size increase of the blockchain.

Schedule

With everything being ready, we have decided to make the switch from the PoW algorithm to DPoPS consensus algorithm at block 800,000, or around February 4th, 2021 at current block time.

There are several things to take into consideration before the release of the mainnet. The switch to mainnet will be organized as followed.

Registration Period

Strart: January 4th, 2021

The registration will enable the delegates to start registering their nodes and open the community voting for them. The registration will start on January 4th and will last until the block 800,000. This period is 1-month long, to enable everyone to prepare their nodes, start communicating around and accepting votes.

Delegates — You have a consequent amount of XCASH, and are looking at getting a delegate position and securing the X-Cash public network? Delegates elected in the top 50 get a block verifier position and get rewarded with the block reward.

If you are planning on running a delegate node, you will be able to register as a delegate on the 4th of January. You can start preparing your node in advance by following the extensive guide to becoming a block verifier on the X-Cash public network.

You will have the time to decide if you want to run a shared delegate (people vote for you and help you get elected, but in return, you share the reward with them), solo delegate (running with you own XCASH without the help of voters, but keep the whole reward for yourself), and the new private group delegate (an agreed-upon list of voters managed by a delegate to control the voting dilution).

Voters — You plan to vote to elect a delegate, and get a share of the block reward in return? We will release everything you need to know to vote securely at the start of the registration period.

The 2.0.0 wallet binaries to start voting will be released on the 4th of January, and we will provide a full comprehensive guide to use the CLI interface and vote for your preferred delegate.

Here are a few considerations to have in mind to be ready at the start of the registration period:

The minimum amount of XCASH to stake/vote is 2,000,000 (Two millions) XCASH. Meaning that if you are trying to vote from a wallet with less than 2M XCASH in it, your vote will be refused.

At the beginning, you will only be able to vote from a CLI wallet and the Android wallet. We will provide an easy guide to help you vote if you have never used the CLI interface.

You won’t be able to vote from the X-Bank directly. It means that you will have to withdraw your XCASH into an X-Cash wallet to be able to vote and stake your XCASH. We will provide a guide for that as well.

Please be minded that you won’t get a share of the block reward from your vote before the block 800,001. But it is a good idea to be ready and have your vote prepared to your delegate so you can stake right away.

Switch to mainnet

Date: February 4th, 2021 (time will be adjusted depending on when we reach block 800,000)

When we arrive at block 800,000 (eight hundred thousand), the network will pause for a couple of hours, and the blockchain will resume by forging the 800,001st block under the new DPoPS consensus algorithm.

What should I do now?

There is still some time before the start of the registration period (January 4th, 2021), and we are taking the time to produce the necessary guide and tutorials for you to make an educated decision for your votes or your decision to run a delegate.

Please don’t hesitate to come and discuss with any of the delegates on our Discord Server.

🙏 Thanks

This wouldn’t have been possible without the help of all the participants in the beta & alpha, that took their time, knowledge, and implications into testing and improving the consensus. So many feedback has been taken into account and used to improve the onboarding and user experience of delegates and the stability of the network.

From all the team and the community of the X-Cash Foundation, we would like to thank and acknowledge the participants of the beta. 👏👏

+------------------------------------+------------------+

| Delegate Node Name | Delegate Name |

+------------------------------------+------------------+

| xcash-ju.fr | Ju |

| swan-x | Cygnus |

| XCAjoca | cajoca |

| x-staking | N3me5is |

| xcash.one | Executor |

| xcash.it | CryptoDuke |

| snakeway | Snakeway | | xcashusa | minerjed |

| x-delegate | Element56 |

| xcashcolombia | Fidentis |

| xcash_lt | Mantas |

| *.xcash.rocks | Miaumiau |

| xcash-dpops.com | Neppers |

| grizzly & aurora | UrsaMajor |

| Atlantis-X | Thomas The Cat |

| xcashdelegate.com | Miraculu |

| Redstar-1 & Redstar-2 | Alibaba |

| xcashdelegate.ph | Mryoso1994 |

| *inkie | Twinkie |

| CryptoWorld | aquila-audax |

| 8bit.services | SHA |

| DELEGATE_DON'T_HATE | IdzaMeMario |

+------------------------------------+------------------+

This list is based on the work of Ju, and might be missing some members. Please contact me (paulxcash#2676 on Discord) if you are missing of the list so I can add you.

These people have tested the consensus and additionally, have thoroughly tested their setup to run a stable node. You can be sure that the X-Cash network will be secured with them running a node.

Also, more than a year ago, people have participated in the first alpha test and brought a lot feedback and improvements, and we want to thank them.

Picatax, Galapagos, akhenaten, Bowcat, Bry Guy, Cygnus, Demo2004, element56, herominers.com, Klendhaar, MadMason, qf3l3k, Quetio, snakeway passer, tjs, Twinkie, UrsaMajor, Zaffy, 𝓕𝓻𝓸𝓰.