- Ethereum’s next upgrade has a compatibility problem. Glamsterdam proposals EIP-8037 and EIP-8038 raise gas charges for creating and touching stored data; under EIP-8037 the base charge for creating a contract rises from 32,000 gas to 183,600, CoinDesk reported.
- Two developers filed rival fixes on Sunday. Leo Glisic’s EIP-8488 keeps existing contracts on today’s gas schedule and charges new rates only to new contracts, while Giulio Rebuffo’s draft charges everyone the new prices but runs a second meter so old apps keep working.
- The risk is already slowing the upgrade. A second test-network rehearsal set for Oct. 26 was postponed after security researchers raised alarms, and developer banteg cited an existing list of 200,000 affected contracts that he said misses many more.
- Neither fix has a target date. Rebuffo’s draft admits no client implementation or consensus tests have been run, and the next private test, estimated for Nov. 16 to 20 at the earliest, was planned before either draft existed.
What Happened?
Two developers filed competing proposals on Sunday to keep Ethereum’s planned Glamsterdam upgrade from breaking apps that already hold users’ money, CoinDesk reported. Glamsterdam includes EIP-8037 and EIP-8038, which raise the gas Ethereum charges for creating and touching stored data; under EIP-8037, the base charge for creating a contract rises from 32,000 gas to 183,600 before code storage and execution costs. Many contracts were written assuming those costs would never change, and some pay a fixed amount of gas when calling another app, so a higher cost makes the call fail. Glisic’s EIP-8488 splits the instruction set so “existing contracts keep the legacy schedule,” while Rebuffo’s design uses two gas meters per transaction, one for execution under old rules and one for billing under the new schedule.
Why It Matters?
Glamsterdam is Ethereum’s next major upgrade, and any delay or design change affects ETH’s development roadmap and the protocols built on it. Security researcher pcaversaccio wrote on X that Glamsterdam “should not be shipped in its current form, period,” and banteg said the gas increases affect “several high profile protocols, not just some random devs misusing opcodes.” Breaking immutable contracts that custody user funds would be a serious risk for decentralized finance, which is why the two drafts take different approaches to what contracts see versus what users pay.
What’s Next?
Both proposals remain drafts without target dates, and Rebuffo’s has not been implemented or tested by any execution client. Developers estimated on Oct. 29 that the next private test of the upgrade could come Nov. 16 to 20 at the earliest. Watch whether core developers adopt one of the fixes or rework the gas repricing before scheduling the next rehearsal.
Affected Tickers and Coins: ETH
Source: CoinDesk
