L2 in skupni paketi: kako delujejo, zakaj jih potrebujemo in kaj sledi (Helen Chmyhankova)

Avtor: Roman Aliev (direktor trženja strategije)

L2 is a collective name for solutions that solve the problems of scalability and speed on blockchain, primarily in the Ethereum network. We’ll tell you about the most popular L2 protocols, their advantages and drawbacks, and what will happen to them now
that Ethereum has switched to Proof-of-Stake. 

L2 in trilema Vitalika Buterina

Ustvarjalec Ethereuma Vitalik Buterin je že leta 2016 prvič opisal t.i blokalska trilema. It boils down to the idea that an ideal blockchain should have three qualities: decentralization,
scalability, and security. However, it’s very difficult to achieve all three at the same time, for several reasons. 

Decentralizacija: več kot je vozlišč v omrežju, težje ga zlonamerni akter prevzame. Toda ko povečujete število vozlišč, potrebujete vedno več sredstev, da dosežejo soglasje, kar upočasnjuje delovanje omrežja.

Varnost: še enkrat, ko je veliko vozlišč, bo omrežje še naprej delovalo, tudi če se nekatera od njih pokvarijo ali bodo napadena. Toda razširljivost trpi: glejte točko o decentralizaciji. 

Razširljivost: ustvarite lahko zelo hitro omrežje, če celotno delo pri preverjanju transakcij prenesete na majhno število vozlišč. Toda takšen blockchain bo centraliziran in lažji za napad. 

Ethereum je zelo decentralizirana in varna veriga. Toda njegova razširljivost je že dolgo boleča točka: ena sama priljubljena prodaja žetonov bi lahko popolnoma ohromila verigo blokov, kot se je zgodilo z Druga stran
metaverse prodaja zemljišča spomladi-2022. 

Otherside metaverse demo. Zasluge: Yuga Labs

The transition to Ethereum 2.0 should help solve this issue, and Vitalik Buterin even believes that the network will reach 100,000 TPS. However, this will happen only after the introduction of sharding: the division of the blockchain state into a number
of shards that will process transactions in parallel and connect to each other through the central Beacon Chain. According to Buterin, it will take 64 shards to reach those coveted 100k TPS.

Sharding is one of the types of L2 (level 2) solutions. They are called Level 2 because they sit on top of the underlying blockchain and take over part of its transactions. The results are eventually recorded on the main blockchain, but those transactions
are processed and confirmed outside of it. This helps make the system scalable, meaning that its performance doesn’t suffer when the load grows. 

Vrste L2 in njihove pomanjkljivosti

Ostriženje

Če se vrnemo k šardiranju, moramo opozoriti, da ni določenega roka za njegovo izvedbo na Ethereumu; nekje leta 2023 je zadnja napoved. Nekatere verige blokov že uporabljajo sharding, vključno z NEAR (tako
far on the level of the blockchain state, not transaction processing) and polkadot (pod imenom parachains).

Sharding does have its problems, communication among shards and security the biggest among them. It’s easier to break a shard than the main blockchain. In Polkadot and Kusama, this risk is partly offset by the central Relay Chain providing shared security
for all the parachains. 

Sidechains

A sidechain is a separate blockchain that is linked to the main L1 chain but has its own security system. The best-known example is Polygon, launched in 2017 as an Ethereum sidechain called Matic Network. Since then Polygon has grown into an independent
ekosistema s več kot 37,000 dAppsin nihče več temu ne reče stranska veriga. 

Tukaj je še nekaj primerov stranske verige:

• Immutable X (Ethereum) – centralizirano in z ničelnimi provizijami je večinoma namenjeno igričarskim projektom.
• Ronin (Ethereum) — stranska veriga, ustvarjena za Axie Infinity, njeno tržnico NFT in Katana DEX.
• WAX (EOS) — še ena igralna stranska veriga, med drugim gosti Alien Worlds in Farmers World. 

Zasluge: DappRadar

Državni kanali

This type of L2 solution implies that two participants open a channel and exchange assets. This is convenient when two addresses conduct many transfers between themselves. When a channel isn’t needed anymore, it can be closed, at which point all the transactions
are committed to the main chain. 

Najbolj priljubljena rešitev v tej kategoriji je Bitcoin's Lightning Network. Zlasti nasveti BTC na Twitterju uporabljajo ta protokol.

Rollupi

Channels, sidechains, and shards have been around for quite a while. The latest trend, which spread like wildfire in 2021, is rollups, such as Arbitrum and Optimism. These are separate blockchains that process transactions outside of the main chain, gather
them into batches, and send that data to the main blockchain. 

Ključna razlika med stranskimi verigami in zbirnimi verigami je v tem, da slednje zagotavljajo glavni verigi kriptografske dokaze, ki omogočajo preverjanje »poštenosti« (pravilnosti podatkov) zbirne verige brez preverjanja samih transakcij. 

Po drugi strani pa so skupni podatki dveh vrst: optimistični in ZK ali brez znanja.

Optimistic: these rollups assume all transactions are valid and transmit them to the main blockchain almost without additional processing. The rollup will only perform a verification if someone disputes the results. This approach increases scalability and
dramatically reduces gas costs, but it can take a week or more to transfer funds from the rollup to Ethereum. The best-known optimistic rollups are Optimism and Arbitrum, as well as MetisDAO in Neumno. 

Arbitrum in Optimism sta med top 10 največjih blockchainov. Zasluge: DeFiLlama

ZK zvitki: they validate transactions using complex cryptographic proofs and transmit these proofs to Ethereum mainnet together with the batches of transactions. ZK stands for „zero knowledge“, meaning that the main chain can verify that
the proofs and the data are correct without knowing anything about their contents. 

Takšen sistem je bolj varen, prenos sredstev v glavno verigo pa traja manj časa kot pri optimističnih skupnih prenosih. Druga stran je, da imajo lahko skupni paketi ZK težave pri delu s pametnimi pogodbami DeFi. 

ZK rollups se uporabljajo v Nespremenljiv X; še več, Polygon, Matter Labs in StarkWare are working on EVM-compatible
ZK solutions. 

Kakšen je pomen L2 za običajne uporabnike?

Do te točke smo razpravljali o teoriji, kaj pa praksa? Kako lahko običajni uporabnik preizkusi rešitve L2 – ali bi jih moral?

Polygon, Arbitrum, and Optimism are cheaper alternatives to Ethereum that support the same large dApps, such as Uniswap, Aave, Curve, Balancer, Sushi, etc. If you like swapping tokens on DEXes, buying NFTs, earning with yield farming, etc., but don’t like
paying up to $5 per transaction, you should try these L2 networks. You’ll be pleased with the low fees ($0.1 or less) and fast processing. 

Po drugi strani pa, če se odločite igrati Axie Infinity, Alien Worlds itd., boste zagotovo srečali Ronin, Immutable X, WAX in druge igralne L2. 

Vse L2 na osnovi Ethereuma, o katerih smo razpravljali v tem članku, je mogoče dodati v MetaMask s funkcijo Dodajanje omrežja. Preprosto poiščite v Googlu pravilne parametre za vsako omrežje. 

Vitalik Buterin meni that optimistic rollups will dominate in the next couple of years, but ZK rollups will come to play a key role in the ecosystem
in the long term. For now, Polygon, Arbitrum, and Optimism 6., 7. in 8. mesto na seznamu največjih verig blokov s skupno 3.7 milijarde dolarjev TVL — zato so vsekakor vredni vaše pozornosti.