Compass Investments

– Performance Improvement: Agave v2.2 significantly speeds up data and task processing in Solana. One of the key innovations is a 20% increase in the block limit, from 50 to 60 million computational units (CUs), allowing more transactions to be processed per block without latency.

Account Lattice Hashing (ALH): Solana has introduced a new way to track account status using homomorphic hashing. Unlike previous complex tree structures, ALH provides fast incremental updates and better scalability, paving the way to support billions of accounts.

SBPF Versioning: Agave v2.2 introduces support for multiple versions of Solana Berkeley Packet Filter (SBPF), the virtual machine for Solana programs. Programs can now specify which version of SBPF they are using, making upgrades easier and more flexible for developers.

Support for Secp256r1 native signature: This long-awaited feature provides Web2-style passwordless security (e.g., Passkeys and 2FA) in Web3 applications on Solana, enhancing security and user experience.

Agave 2.2 will also bring many other web enhancements – we’ll detail them below, free of charge:

the Solana network was already facing a 50M CU limit. With the move to 60M CU, the network will be able to handle more load, reduce congestion and lower transaction fees. But this comes with certain challenges. The main challenges include ensuring that infrastructure such as RPC nodes can handle the higher speeds, and that blocks can spread quickly across the network within the 400 millisecond target.

To address this challenge, the Solana team is redesigning the block propagation pipeline using XDP (eXpress Data Path), a high-performance networking feature that reduces latency in data transmission.