Privacy Crypto Grin's First Hard Fork Planned for Mid-July

Grin developers have reached a rough agreement on a block number and expected date of activation for the crypto network's first ever system-wide upgrade or hard fork.

On Wednesday, developers re-discussed Le Sceller's hard fork timeline, which also calls for launching a private test network for the upgrade in the beginning of June and activation of the upgrade on the public Grin test network - called Floonet - on June 19.

Taking a step back, Grin is a privacy-focussed cryptocurrency that leverages a technology called MimbleWimble to obfuscate transaction activity.

During today's impromptu meeting, Grin core developer Michael Cordner who goes by the pseudonym "Yeastplume" emphasized that while the proposed timeline could change, efforts should be taken to stick by the schedule.

The scheduled hard fork in July is actually one of four anticipated system-wide upgrades in Grin's two-year roadmap of the Grin blockchain, designed to keep specialized mining hardware from proliferating on the network.

Most notably, Grin employs two different proof-of-work mining algorithms that dictate the efficacy of using ASICs versus more general computing devices called GPUs.

In order to ensure that the secondary mining algorithm - Cuckaroo29 - stay truly ASIC-resistant for the initial period of two years, Grin developers agreed to execute minor changes to the later upgrade every six or so months.

Grin's first upcoming hard fork will execute a change to the Cuckaroo29 mining algorithm designed to ensure its ASIC-resistant qualities on the network.

Outside of the mining algorithm tweak, Grin's first hard fork activation will also feature notable upgrades to the cryptocurrency's wallet software aimed at increasing wallet flexibility and usability.

Le Sceller added that mining pools, exchanges, and other users interacting with the Grin protocol will need to upgrade both their node and wallet software in order to accept new blocks and build transactions past the anticipated hard fork point.