The Cardano (ADA) network is reportedly preset to undergo an upgrade, in preparation for the arrival of Ouroboros BFT – an updated consensus mechanism. 

Specifically, the upgrade is an intermediate transition, from the existing Byron era to Shelley, which will come with mainnet staking feature. Cardano network will experience a hard fork, which is revealed by the team to be “a planned and managed protocol upgrade.”

The new protocol is an updated version from the Ouroboros “Classic” – currently being deployed on Cardano’s mainnet. Although the security level of the Ouroboros proof-of-stake consensus protocol is generally accepted, a few compromises in decentralization has happened to the “Classic”.

Cardano’s Shelley era will primarily look to remove the “training wheels”, while enabling community-focused block validators choosing via staking. Ouroboros Praos will be the facilitating network for this era, with a few added features that minimizes the possibility of validators corruption. 

In the transition from 1 era to the other, Cardano will be dividing it into 2 seperate hard forks. This is an attempt to make sure that nothing will run interference with network service, since the community is entrusted with the validation. 

The Cardano team has gone through some rough waters, regarding its plans for Shelley. Despite the project to be originally rolled out before 2019 ended, only an incentivized testnet was released in December.