A Decentralized Mainnet Launch for Nervos CKB

Nervos Network
Oct 29, 2019 · 3 min read

The official CKB Genesis Block Generator is available here (please use the latest released version: https://github.com/nervosnetwork/genesis-block-generator/releases

In May of this year, we launched our testnet — ”Rylai.” Since launching Rylai, the Layer 1 Common Knowledge Base (CKB) of the Nervos Network has undergone over 200 days of long-term testing in a real network environment. All features planned for Nervos CKB mainnet launch have now been completed, and the code base was feature-freezed on Oct. 19, 2019.

In preparation for mainnet, we completed 2 fully independent security audits with leading security teams PeckShield and Least Authority, launched 5 mining competitions (with hashrate exceeding 20 TH/s), and kicked off our Bug Bounty program.

After careful review, we believe that CKB has already met the functional and stability requirements of mainnet, and we’re ready to launch our first mainnet release — ”Lina.”

Decentralization is a fundamental principle of the Nervos Network. For a decentralized common knowledge base, and in the spirit and tradition of both Bitcoin and Ethereum mainnet launches, the generation of the Nervos CKB genesis block and the launch of CKB mainnet will happen in a completely decentralized and community-driven way.

Nervos CKB mainnet launch will take the following approach:

  1. The Nervos Foundation will provide an open-source Genesis Block Generator (GBG) on Nov. 9th. The GBG will be written according to the Nervos Foundation’s token distribution scheme published previously, which generates the genesis block of mainnet based on pre-agreed token distribution rules and input.
  2. The GBG will take all block data from the last testnet as input. In addition to the initial token distribution, the genesis block will also embed the hash of the testnet block at specific position as a proof of work and time, thereby ensuring the uniqueness and validity of the Genesis block. If multiple blocks exist at the same position, the first one got 12 confirmations will be taken as the right block. Nervos Foundation will publish the block data on official channels immediately.
  3. The third stage of the mining competition will last 90 epochs. The block hash of the last block in Epoch 89 (89 is the epoch number, which starts from 0) will be used to generate the Genesis block. The estimated mainnet launch time is November 16 2019 (exact time TBA).

We firmly believe that everyone should be able to generate the unique genesis block in a verifiable way, where a local CKB node can boot and become connected to other nodes across the world, to form a decentralized network of common knowledge. Anyone running a CKB testnet node will have everything needed to generate the genesis block for mainnet, at the same time as everyone else. The consensus of the entire community will be reached for the first time through this decentralized launch approach.

Join us as we launch the decentralized infrastructure for the new economy.

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Nervos Network

The Nervos Network is a public blockchain ecosystem and…

Nervos Network

The Nervos Network is a public blockchain ecosystem and collection of protocols aiming to solve the current challenges facing blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum today.

Nervos Network

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Official account for the Nervos Network.

Nervos Network

The Nervos Network is a public blockchain ecosystem and collection of protocols aiming to solve the current challenges facing blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum today.