This is the first (of two) mandatory upgrades required to transition to the SESH token, and kicks off the move to SESH TGE.

This mandatory update, compared to the earlier 11.1.x releases, includes a few bug fixes, but most importantly adds the upgrade to the intermediate "Anchor" hardfork, internally called hardfork 20.

Hardfork 20 begins at block 1836239, which is expected to arrive at Tue, 29 Apr 2025 00:00, UTC.

This release sets to stage for moving to TGE, but having nodes create and start broadcasting their new BLS public keys which are needed to seed the initial SESH service node contract with the network's public keys.

Compared to the last mandatory version, 10.6, this Oxen 11 release brings myriad changes to reliability and performance, a new logging system, new more maintainable RPC layer, along with all the code (not yet activated on mainnet) to turn the oxen chain into the "work chain" following the upcoming SESH Arbitrum launch. This is the same code (fix fixes) that has been active on our public "stagenet" for a few months, but we are now confident enough to recommend this version instead of the current 10.6.x release for existing and new installations.

Important notes for upgrading

• This upgrade adds a new key file, key_bls, in your oxen data directory. Restoring or moving a node requires this key, and so you should ensure that you back it up along with your existing key_ed25519 (and possibly key, for very old nodes).

• This hardfork disables new service node registrations until the transition is complete. (This was necessary because we will need to take a snapshot of all service nodes in order to build them into the next release as well as to prepare the contracts for the next release).

• A new version of storage server, 2.10.0, is required for service nodes.

• You can expect another mandatory upgrade to follow, which will complete the transition to SESH.

• For operators running nodes on Ubuntu 20.04, please note that this Ubuntu version is nearing the end of its support lifetime at the end of May, and while we still support 20.04 packages for this and the upcoming final transition release, these release are expected to be the last major releases where we continue to support Ubuntu 20.04. Upgrading to 22.04, or better yet, 24.04 is recommended.

Specifying an L2 provider

oxend requires being set up with an Arbitrum One RPC provider to be able to follow the upcoming smart contracts. This requires adding a line such as:

l2-provider=https://arbitrum-one-provider-url

to the oxen.conf configuration file. (You can add multiple such lines if you want to have a primary + backup L2 providers).

If you run multiple service nodes, it is also possible to have some of your oxend nodes provide L2 information to other nodes to reduce the number of L2 RPC requests (and thus RPC provider fees). More information on L2 proxying can be found in the docs.

Updating service nodes

For service node operators using Debian 11+ and Ubuntu 20.04+, the upgraded packages are available from our APT repository. Static binaries for other users are available below. Note that Ubuntu 20.04 support will be dropped in the near future, and operators on 20.04 should start planning to upgrade to 22.04 or 24.04.

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