Delegation Program Tiebreak System

At the end of every delegation cycle, the Delegation Program Uptime Tracker determines up to 240 external validators who have received the highest Performance Scores. In cases where a tiebreak is needed, a random tiebreak process is implemented to ensure fairness and transparency. You can follow these verification instructions to verify the results.

How the Delegation Program Tiebreak System Works

1. Block producer keys that straddle the 240th place in the uptime snapshot are determined eligible to receive a Mina Foundation Delegation.

2. This list of tied keys is sorted alphanumerically using the canonical ASCII representation.

3. The sorted list is randomized using the Random.org advanced List Randomizer.

   The VRF seed from the last epoch of the previous cycle is used as the “persistent identifier”.

Verifying the Delegation Program Random Tiebreak

Requirements

To verify the Delegation Program random tiebreak result, you must have:

• The [Verifiable Random Function VRF seed from the last epoch of the previous cycle.
• The list of tied wallet addresses.
• A sorting tool. For example, https://onlinestringtools.com/sort-strings.
• A randomizing tool. For example, https://www.random.org/lists/?mode=advanced.

Instructions

1. Identify the VRF seed from the last epoch of the previous cycle.

   • The VRF seed is posted with the list of the Top 240 eligible delegatees.

   • To obtain the VRF seed by yourself, you can query the https://api.minascan.io/node/v1/graphql using the last epoch of the previous cycle with:

     query epochSeed {
       blocks(limit: 1, query: {canonical: true, protocolState: {consensusState: {epoch: 33}}}) {
         protocolState {
           consensusState {
             stakingEpochData {
               seed
             }
           }
         }
       }
     }

     The results of this sample query for Epoch 33 return the seed:

     2vbJHBGhsg12Hpm5y8QDz3VkR5XfNtK7HsyybWS83TGQrrJLRPiN

2. Sort the tied wallet addresses alphanumerically using the canonical ASCII representation.

   To use a tool like Sort Strings:

   • Clear the Sort strings numerically checkbox.
   • Enter the tied addresses in input strings with no extra spaces or line breaks.
   • Copy the sorted wallet addresses from sorted strings.

3. Randomize the sorted list of tied wallet addresses using Random.org and the VRF seed from Step 1.

   • In Part 1: Enter List Items on https://www.random.org/lists/?mode=advanced, enter the sorted list of addresses.

   • In Part 2: Choose Output Format, select As a bare-bones text document (type text/plain).

   • In Part 3: Choose Randomization, select Use pregenerated randomization based on persistent identifier enter-id-here (max 64 alphanumeric characters) and enter the VRF seed you identified in the “enter-id-here” field.

   • In Part 4: Go!, select Randomize.

     

You can follow this process to confirm the random tiebreak result.

You can engage with the community and post questions in the #delegation-program channel on Mina Protocol Discord.