Headline: Stellar’s Protocol 30 “Bell” lands on testnet — mainnet vote set for Nov. 23 Stellar’s long‑anticipated Protocol 30 upgrade, nicknamed Bell, is now live on testnet — a major step toward rolling out new smart‑contract functionality, quantum‑resistant signature verification and the groundwork for faster ledger timing. The Stellar Development Foundation announced the testnet activation on Nov. 4 and has scheduled a validator vote to activate Bell on mainnet for Nov. 23 at 17:00 UTC; mainnet activation will require validator approval. What Bell brings (three CAPs) - CAP‑84 — Muxed contract addresses: Smart contracts can now accept and identify many customers behind a single contract address. Bell introduces contract addresses that carry a 64‑bit customer identifier (a format starting with “W”, distinct from existing muxed accounts that begin with “M”). When tokens are sent to these addresses, the funds reach the underlying contract while the customer ID is recorded in the transfer event. This lets exchanges, payment providers and custodians manage deposits for potentially millions of users without deploying individual contracts per user. - CAP‑87 — Post‑quantum signature verification in Soroban: Bell adds on‑chain support for checking ML‑DSA signatures inside Soroban smart contracts. ML‑DSA is one of the NIST‑standardized post‑quantum signature algorithms (2024) and is designed to resist attacks from powerful quantum computers. Under Bell, developers can require ML‑DSA approval inside smart accounts to add quantum‑resistant spending controls. Because ML‑DSA checks are compute‑heavy, verification runs through Stellar Core. Protocol 30 exposes three verification functions corresponding to ML‑DSA’s security tiers. Note: network‑level transaction signatures remain Ed25519 until a future upgrade. - CAP‑88 — Millisecond ledger timestamps: Stellar will record ledger close times with millisecond resolution instead of whole seconds. That change removes a technical barrier to sub‑second ledger intervals in future upgrades (Protocol 28 already trimmed typical mainnet close times from ~5.7s to 5s). CAP‑88 itself does not immediately shorten mainnet close times; it changes the ledger header format to enable more precise timing later. Developer and infrastructure notes - Bell requires updates across the ecosystem. Stellar has released Protocol 30‑compatible versions of Core, Horizon, RPC and Galexie, and published SDK updates: JavaScript SDK v17.3.0, Go SDK v0.8.0 and a release candidate for the Soroban Rust SDK. - Validators must install Stellar Core v30.0.0 ahead of the Nov. 23 mainnet vote. Exchanges, wallets, indexers and analytics providers need to update their XDR definitions and decoding logic because the new ledger header format can break older SDKs and raw‑data parsers. Existing Soroban contracts will continue to run unchanged, but toolchains must be updated to take advantage of Bell features. Context and implications - CAP‑84 closes a gap between legacy muxed accounts (useful for custodians and exchanges) and programmable smart accounts, enabling large custodial operations to use Soroban‑driven logic without massive contract sprawl. - CAP‑87 is the first on‑chain step in Stellar’s Quantum Preparedness Plan. Other blockchains are pursuing similar moves (for example, Sui has outlined plans for NIST‑approved quantum‑safe authentication). - CAP‑88 paves the way for future performance tuning. Stellar Core developers are already experimenting with faster ledger processing thanks to the finer timestamp resolution. Ecosystem momentum - The Protocol 30 push comes amid other recent developments on Stellar, including VIA Labs’ late‑October cross‑chain messaging integration between Stellar and Ethereum, which allows Soroban contracts to exchange messages with Ethereum contracts — useful for stablecoins, tokenized assets and cross‑chain workflows. What to watch - Validator vote on mainnet: Nov. 23, 17:00 UTC — outcome determines Bell activation. - Infrastructure readiness: Exchanges, wallets, indexers and SDK users should install the v30 software and update decoders/XDR to avoid service interruptions. - Developer adoption: Expect tooling updates and early Soroban contracts to begin using muxed contract addresses and ML‑DSA verification after mainnet activation. Stellar’s testnet activation is the concrete milestone many in the ecosystem have been waiting for — Bell doesn’t just add features, it also prepares the network for quantum threats and faster settlement intervals down the road. Keep an eye on the Nov. 23 vote for the next decisive step. Read more AI-generated news on: https://app.chaingpt.org/news