Weekly Update: W/C 06th June, 2022

Good evening everyone 👋

Last week we talked about expanding the DNS layer to 24 Stargates, with points of presence all across the globe. This week we’ve been watching how it has performed, and we are amazed.

Last week we switched a long-term customer — who previously used Amazon Route 53 for DNS — over to Edge DNS. When we compared the performance of 28 May 2022 (DNS via Route 53) with 4 June 2022 (DNS via Edge), we saw the average page load time 42.95% faster; the average redirection time 66.74% faster; the average domain lookup time 38.25% faster; the average server connection time 49.48% faster; the average server response time 4.35% faster; and the average page download time 77.90% faster.

What does this actually mean for them and their users? We saw the number of sessions per user increase by 3.36%; the number of pages per session increase by 0.78%; the average session duration increase by 1.88%; and the bounce rate reduce by 2.93%!

This is a great result and shows that not only are we on par with an industry leading DNS provider, but that early indicators show network performance surpassing it.

Edge DNS will be available to use publicly soon. ETA? July.

The Edge Accounts system — you know, the one where you’ll be able to spin up Edge Servers instantly, integrate Edge CDN into your content deliver pipeline, and deliver real-world performance enhancements with Edge DNS — well that’s coming along really well. Some of you may have noticed that there have been test.network transactions relating to invoices. We’ve been hard at work and now have billing and payments working in XE. This is the first step towards an XE-powered Edge service offering, and it’s only the beginning.

We’re putting the finishing touches on this new system and can’t wait to share it with you. We will be opening up Edge Servers first, allowing you to quickly spin up fully functional Linux virtual machines and pay for them with XE. No contracts, no minimum terms, hourly billing and daily payment cycles mean you use what you want, when you want.

Following this, we will be releasing Edge DNS, shortly followed by Edge CDN and FIAT & crypto top up options. And we have so much more in store as well.

Last week we also talked about the expansion of the Gateway layer in mainnet. We’ve been busy preparing these nodes across the globe, ensuring peering arrangements are in place and the machines are configured correctly. Next week we expect to be bringing these online on mainnet and switching over Gateway traffic to them. While testnet is up and running (and running well), we’re working hard to make sure that everything is in place so that the upgrade can go ahead without downtime.

And finally, Stargate v2.9.8-213 was deployed to mainnet, fixing an issue with SSL certificate synchronisation between certificate authority and Stargates. Some certificates were renewing but Gateways weren’t updating their local copies. This is no longer the case.

And that’s that for this week.

Enjoy your weekends.