Ethereum developers launched a new test network, Hood, Monday, which will be used to perform Blockchain’s upcoming ‘pectra’ upgrade.

Pectra goes live on Hood on March 26, and if all goes well, the long -awaited upgrade to Etheruem’s mainnet continues about 30 days later, according to the network’s core developers.

Hood was created after defective pectra tests on Ethereum’s other test nettes, Holeky and Sepolia, which could not complete properly due to problems with how they were configured.

Test networks such as Holeky, Sepolia and Hood are aiming to emulate the most important Ethereum-Network-Well allows developers to test code changes or major upgrades such as pectra in a low insert environment before implementing them to mainnet.

Originally, the pectra upgrade would have been activated at Ethereum after these two previous tests. Because they did not go smoothly, developers decided to build hood to test the ambitious pectra upgrade once again, although the test network can also be used for future tests.

Hood is designed to mimic Ethereum’s mainnet with the same number of validators on its network. Ethereum -core developer Parithosh Jayanthi argued during last week’s Ethereum core developers call that hood would therefore be the test network for Ethereum stake pools and node operators to test their infrastructure.

Holeky and Sepolia were built for different purposes: Holeky has a larger validator set than Ethereum’s mainnet, which is supposed to help test scalability problems, while Sepolia is a closed network just for developers, intended to test applications.

Pectra contains a number of upgrades designed to make Ethereum more user -friendly and effective for developers and end users. One of the biggest changes includes the addition of “smart contract” features that can give wallets new features as the opportunity to pay gas fees in cryptocurrencies other than ether (ETH).

Read more: Ethereum developers launch new test network for pectra upgrade after previous setback