Ripple Engineer Clarifies Key XRP Ledger Update Metric: What's Important?

$XRP Ledger version 3.3.0 launched in the past week, with its upgrade progress across the entire network now in focus. In this context, RippleX software engineer Mayukha Vadari has provided an important clarification on an update progress metric.

The conversation began when an X user posted that XRPL UNL validators have met the 'Sufficiently Updated' threshold of 80% on version 3.3.0 of XRPLD, hoping for amendment voting to gain traction.

That prompted a question from $XRP community member @offledger, who asked whether the "Sufficiently Updated" consideration applies to the entire network rather than only validators.

The original poster suggested that a set number rather than a percentage might be more appropriate for non-validating nodes, as software versions can vary considerably across that portion of the network. He cited XRPScan figures that showed 74 nodes on version 3.3.0 and 58 on version 3.2.1.

Offledger clarified that the consideration has always been measured against the entirety of the network rather than only UNL validators; this implies about 32% of the network had updated to 3.3.0 while 68% of the network currently runs version 3.2.1.

"A wee way to go yet," Offledger said, suggesting that the broader network still has significant ground to cover before 3.3.0 reaches widespread adoption.

Responding to the discussion over the 'Sufficiently Updated' threshold of 80%, Vadari said this is the metric that most validators use, adding that 80% of the UNL updating is the bare minimum, not the norm.

$XRP Ledger consensus structure explained

The X discussion highlighted an important distinction between UNL validators and the broader XRPL network.

The xrpld is one of the two main types of server software that power the $XRP Ledger and can run in several modes depending on its configuration. One of these is P2P, which is the main mode of the server. This includes validators, which help secure the network by participating in consensus. A unique node list (UNL) is a server's list of validators that it trusts not to collude with every $XRP Ledger server configured with a UNL.

Hub servers relay messages between many other members of the peer-to-peer network, while the API server provides API access to read data from the shared ledger, submit transactions, and watch activity in the ledger.

These form a peer-to-peer network that processes transactions and maintains the shared state of the $XRP Ledger.