Many long-established clients accumulate bloat over time. This often occurs due to the need to support legacy features for existing users or through attempts to implement overly ambitious software. The result is often complex, difficult-to-maintain, and error-prone systems.

In contrast, our philosophy is rooted in simplicity:

1. Write minimal code
2. Prioritize clarity
3. Embrace simplicity in design

We believe this approach is the best way to build a client that is both fast and resilient. By adhering to these principles, we will be able to iterate fast and explore next-generation features early, either from the Ethereum roadmap or from innovations from the L2s.

To build the main executable and its crates, run:

make build

Note: To execute EF tests, the test fixtures are required. To download them, run:

make download-vectors

To run the tests from a crate, run:

make test CRATE=<crate>

Or just run all the tests:

make test

To run a localnet, we can use a fork of Ethereum Package, specifically this branch that adds support to our client. We have that included in our repo as a just target. Make sure to fetch it like follows:

just checkout-ethereum-package

Let's now install kurtosis:

# Make sure to have docker installed

# Kurtosis cli
brew install kurtosis-tech/tap/kurtosis-cli

To run the localnet:

# Make sure we build our docker image with latest changes
docker build -t ethereum_rust .

# Ethereum package is included in the repo as a just target.
kurtosis run --enclave lambdanet ethereum-package --args-file network_params.yaml

To stop the localnet:

kurtosis enclave stop lambdanet ; kurtosis enclave rm lambdanet

Add support to follow a post-Merge localnet as a read-only RPC Node. This first milestone will only support a canonical chain (every incoming block has to be the child of the current head).

RPC endpoints

• engine_newPayloadV3 (excl. block building) ✅
• eth_blobBaseFee ✅
• eth_blockNumber ✅
• eth_call (at head block) ✅
• eth_chainId ✅
• eth_createAccessList (at head block) ✅
• eth_estimateGas
• eth_feeHistory
• eth_getBalance (at head block) ✅
• eth_getBlockByHash ✅
• eth_getBlockByNumber ✅
• eth_getBlockReceipts ✅
• eth_getBlockTransactionCountByNumber ✅
• eth_getCode (at head block) ✅
• eth_getStorageAt (at head block) ✅
• eth_getTransactionByBlockHashAndIndex ✅
• eth_getTransactionByBlockNumberAndIndex ✅
• eth_getTransactionByHash ✅
• eth_getTransactionCount ✅

See issues and progress: https://github.com/lambdaclass/ethereum_rust/milestone/1

Implement DevP2P protocol, including RLPx p2p and eth capabilities. This will allow us to receive and send blocks and transactions from other nodes and is a prerequisite for the next milestones.

RPC endpoints

• admin_nodeInfo ✅
• eth_sendTransaction
• eth_sendRawTransaction

See issues and progress: https://github.com/lambdaclass/ethereum_rust/milestone/2

Implement support for block reorganizations and historical state queries. This milestone involves persisting the state trie to enable efficient access to historical states and implementing a tree structure for the blockchain to manage multiple chain branches.

RPC endpoints

• engine_exchangeCapabilities
• engine_forkchoiceUpdatedV3
• eth_call (at any block)
• eth_createAccessList (at any block)
• eth_getBalance (at any block)
• eth_getCode (at any block)
• eth_getProof
• eth_getStorageAt (at any block)

See issues and progress: https://github.com/lambdaclass/ethereum_rust/milestone/4

Add snap sync protocol, which lets us get a recent copy of the blockchain state instead of going through all blocks from genesis. Since we don't support older versions of the spec by design, this is a prerequisite to being able to sync the node with public networks, including mainnet.

RPC endpoints

• engine_forkchoiceUpdatedV3
• engine_newPayloadV3
• eth_syncing

See issues and progress: https://github.com/lambdaclass/ethereum_rust/milestone/3

Keep transactions received from other nodes in memory, and add the ability to build new payloads, so that the consensus client can propose new blocks.

RPC endpoints

• engine_getPayloadV3
• engine_newPayloadV3 (with block building)