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Damir Vodenicarevic edited this page Dec 20, 2021 · 1 revision

Rationale

This page describes how blocks and byte-code in the block graph are brought to the smart contract VM for execution.

Summary

The general idea is that the Smart Contract Engine (SCE) takes an initial SCE ledger loaded from file and iteratively updates it by executing all Slots in order from (0,0) up to the current latest slot. At each one of those slots, there might be a block (either final or in the active Blockclique) containing a certain number of ExecuteSC operations, or a miss (lack of block in the slot). ExecuteSC operations within a block are tentatively executed in the order they appear in the block.

Each one of those ExecuteSC operations has already spent max_gas * gas_price + coins from the CSS ledger so that the block creator is certain to get the gas fees (they cannot be spent in-between). When an ExecuteSC operation is executed on the SCE side, it immediately credits the block producer with max_gas * gas_price in the SCE ledger, then it credits the target address with coins in the SCE ledger, then it executes the byte-code inside the ExecuteSC operation. If byte-code execution fails (invalid byte-code or execution error), everything is reverted except the max_gas * gas_price credit to the block producer and coins are sent back to the sender on the SCE side.

This scheme works in theory but requires heavy optimizations in practice because not everything can be recomputed from genesis at every slot or Blockclique change, especially since old blocks are forgotten. Such optimizations include keeping only a final ledger on the SCE side and a list of changes caused by active blocks that can be applied to the final ledger on-the-fly.

Block sequencing

SCE vs CSS finality

Block finality on the CSS side (CSS-finality) can happen in any order (see scientific paper). To ensure that final slots (blocks or misses) are taken into account in a fully sequential way on the SCE side, we introduce a stronger definition of finality on the SCE side (SCE-finality).

A slot S is SCE-final if-and-only-if all the following criteria are met:
* all slots before B are SCE-final`
* S either contains a CSS-final block or there is a CSS-final block in the same thread at a later period

That way, we ensure that once a slot becomes SCE-final, the final SCE ledger won't ever have to be rolled back because no new blocks can appear at that slot or before it.

The SCE-finality of a block implies its CSS-finality but the opposite may not always be true.

CSS: notifying SCE about Blockclique changes

The Blockclique can change whenever a new block is added to the graph:

  • another maximal clique can become the new Blockclique if its fitness becomes higher than the current Blockclique's
  • a new active non-CSS-final block can be added to the Blockclique
  • blocks are removed from the Blockclique when they become CSS-final

Every time the Blockclique changes, Consensus calls ExecutionCommandSender::blockclique_changed(..) with the list of blocks that became CSS-final, and the full list of blocks that belong to the updated Blockclique.

SCE setup

The SCE (ExecutionWorker) carries:

  • a VM (that also includes a CSS-final ledger and a active slot history)
  • a last_final_slot cursor pointing to the latest executed SCE-final slot
  • a last_active_slot cursor pointing to the latest executed slot
  • a pending_css_final_blocks list of CSS-final blocks that are not yet SCE-final

SCE: processing Blockclique change notifications

When the SCE receives a Blockclique change notification from the CSS with parameters new_css_final_blocks and blockclique_blocks:

1 - reset the SCE state back to its latest final state

Note that this is sub-optimal as only invalidated slots should be reverted.

  • revert the VM to its latest SCE-final state by clearing its active slot history.
  • set last_active_slot = last_final_slot

2 - process CSS-final blocks

  • extend pending_css_final_blocks with new_css_final_blocks
  • iterate over every slot S starting from last_final_slot.get_next_slot() up to the latest slot in pending_css_final_blocks (included)
    • if there is a block B at slot S in pending_css_final_blocks:
      • remove B from pending_css_final_blocks
      • call the VM to execute the SCE-final block B at slot S
      • set last_active_slot = last_final_slot = S
    • otherwise, if there is a block in pending_css_final_blocks at a later period of the same thread as S:
      • call the VM to execute an SCE-final miss at slot S
      • set last_active_slot = last_final_slot = S
    • otherwise it means that we have reached a non-SCE-final slot:
      • break

At this point, the VM has updated its final SCE ledger, and blocks that remain to be processed are in blockclique_blocks UNION pending_css_final_blocks.

3 - process CSS-active blocks

  • define sce_active_blocks = blockclique_blocks UNION pending_css_final_blocks
  • iterate over every slot S starting from last_active_slot.get_next_slot() up to the latest slot in sce_active_blocks (included)
    • if there is a block B at slot S in sce_active_blocks:
      • call the VM to execute the SCE-active block B at slot S
      • set last_active_slot = S
    • otherwise:
      • call the VM to execute an SCE-active miss at slot S
      • set last_active_slot = S

At this point, the SCE has executed all SCE-active blocks. It only needs to fill up the remaining slots until now with misses.

4 - fill the remaining slots with misses

  • iterate over every slot S starting from last_active_slot.get_next_slot() up to the latest slot at the current timestamp (included):
    • call the VM to execute an SCE-active miss at slot S
    • set last_active_slot = S

Note that this miss-filling algorithm needs to be called again at every slot tick, even in the absence of Blockclique change notifications.

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