Walrus Multi-Phase Transition: No Shutdown During Node Churn
Epoch transitions happen constantly in real networks. Validators fail, new ones join, maintenance requires reboots. Most systems require carefully orchestrated coordination: halt operations, migrate data, restart. This is expensive and fragile.
Walrus operates through phase-based transitions that never require shutdown. The system is divided into logical phases, each overlapping with its predecessor. Operations continue throughout.
Phase one: New committee awakens. New validators start operating and accept new data writes. They begin reconstructing historical data from the old committee. Reads continue against the old committee. The network carries both responsibilities without conflict.
Phase two: Data replication progresses. New validators work to reconstruct all old blobs and confirm them on-chain. During this phase, writes flow exclusively to new committee. Reads still prefer old committee (data is there) but can increasingly route to new committee as blobs become available.
Phase three: Migration completes. Most historical blobs are now held by new validators. Reads gradually shift to the new committee. Old validators can reject new read requests (they're no longer needed) while remaining available for clients still requesting old data.
Phase four: Old committee decommissions. As reads for historical data dwindle, old validators can be retired. New validators are now the sole committee. The transition is complete.
This multi-phase approach prevents any single point of synchronization. No atomic handover required. No service interruption. The system transitions continuously, absorbing node churn as a normal operational property rather than a special case requiring shutdown.
@Walrus 🦭/acc remains available throughout. That's the definition of production infrastructure.