Péter Szilágyi, a key figure in the Ethereum development team, has raised concerns about the practice of many Ethereum clients “very aggressively” deleting old data, which could lead to over-reliance on the Geth client.
Ethereum software client Geth, also known as Go Ethereum, is at the center of this discussion. Szilágyi emphasized the potential risks this poses to data availability and network decentralization.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter) on May 27, Szilágyi discussed the complexities of Ethereum‘s storage system, drawing comparisons to long-standing debates in Bitcoin’s development. His main concern is Ethereum‘s increasing dependence on Geth for data storage as the network scales.
Szilágyi noted that while Geth retains old chain segments, many other Ethereum clients choose to “aggressively” delete this data because it is not immediately needed. These clients operate on the assumption that old data can be reprocessed when required.
“Most of the other clients beside Geth started very aggressively deleting old chain segments, because they aren’t needed. The reasoning is that you can reprocess the chain, so you ‘full sync’, but there’s no need to keep the data (yeah, because Geth maintains it for us, losers),” Szilágyi explained.
While this approach can optimize storage in the short term, Szilágyi warns of significant long-term risks. He argues that data, once discarded, tends to disappear permanently, making it increasingly difficult to find nodes willing to store and serve this data. This could undermine the network’s resilience and decentralization.
The Ethereum community has been concerned about the dependency on specific Ethereum clients for some time. According to Ethernodes, over 40% of Ethereum clients rely on Geth, while nearly 38% use Nethermind, another Ethereum client. This concentration has prompted major cryptocurrency companies, such as Coinbase, to explore alternative Ethereum execution clients to diversify their infrastructure.
Summary Review: Szilágyi‘s comments highlight an important issue within the Ethereum network: the balance between data management and long-term network health. While aggressive data deletion may offer immediate storage benefits, it poses potential risks to the network’s decentralization and data availability. This has led to a broader discussion about the need for diverse and resilient client infrastructures to ensure the robustness of Ethereum’s ecosystem.
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