IOHK Blog: Combinator makes easy work of Shelley hard fork
A behind-the-scenes look with Duncan Coutts and Edsko de Vries
May 7, 2020 Anthony Quinn 11 mins read
Since the launch of the Incentivized Testnet marked the coming of the Shelley era last year, the Cardano platform has entered a fast-moving period of development. The Ouroboros Classic consensus protocol has supported Cardano Byron and the ada cryptocurrency for the past 30 months, and we’ll soon be switching to Ouroboros Praos. This is the version of our proof-of-stake (PoS) protocol that will initially power Shelley as Cardano decentralizes. It builds in the staking process with monetary rewards for ada holders and stake pool owners.
We upgraded Cardano on February 20 with a hard fork that switched the mainnet from the original consensus protocol, Ouroboros Classic, to an updated version, Ouroboros BFT. This BFT hard fork began a transition period under Ouroboros BFT, a slimmed-down version of the protocol designed to help us make the switch to Praos, while still preventing any malicious behaviour. Many probably didn’t even notice. For Daedalus wallet users, it meant a standard software update. Exchanges had to upgrade manually, but they had several weeks to do this and we were on hand to help.