Cardano Reopens Public Testnet for Dijkstra Upgrade on Node 11.1.3

Public Testnet Live on Node 11.1.3

Staking pool operators and application developers have somewhere to point their nodes again. Cardano (ADA) reopened its public testnet on October 21 to prepare the Dijkstra upgrade, and the environment accepts connections now even though the new protocol rules are not yet active. Intersect, the ecosystem organization that coordinates upgrade work across the Cardano ecosystem, confirmed the relaunch in its weekly update. The relaunch matters as a development in itself: earlier phases of the Dijkstra rollout existed as code milestones without a public network to test them against.

The reopened network runs node 11.1.3 with Conway protocol version 11, which means the ledger still follows the existing rule set. Connection is the first job. Operators reach the testnet with configuration files published in the official operational documentation, and a faucet dispenses test ADA, the network's native asset, so teams can transact without spending real funds. The testnet ADA carries no market value and exists only for this kind of work. Developers can use the same environment to confirm that wallets, explorers and transaction tooling still parse the current block and transaction formats.

Cardano (ADA) runs on delegated proof of stake, so the operators of staking pools are the parties that produce blocks, and their software readiness decides whether the chain keeps moving through a hard fork. The public environment lets them verify connectivity and tooling in advance instead of discovering problems mid-transition. Nothing Dijkstra-specific is live yet. The protocol version number sets which rules the consensus mechanism enforces, and version 11 means Conway's rules still apply end to end. No version 12 parameters, no new block format and no mainnet schedule have appeared. What the update does provide is an ordered sequence: connect now, upgrade the node next, then fork.

Node 11.2 and the Version 12 Fork

Node 11.2 comes next as a pre-release. Once it ships, the plan is to refresh the testnet configuration and run the hard fork procedure that moves the network to Dijkstra protocol version 12. Intersect has said it will submit the hard fork initiation action only after that pre-release lands, which makes the node build the gating item for everything that follows.

Dijkstra is the ledger era that succeeds Conway. Cardano's official glossary describes its first stage as including Linear Leios, a design meant to raise transaction throughput, and nested transactions, which bundle several transactions for processing together. Neither feature runs on the reopened testnet; both arrive with version 12. Preparation reaches beyond node software. Wallets and indexers, the services that query historical transactions, must also be readied for the new block and transaction formats that Dijkstra introduces.

The fork itself is a governance event rather than an automatic switch. The hard fork initiation action must be ratified by DReps, the delegated representatives who vote on behalf of delegators, together with staking pool operators and the Constitutional Committee. The delegate set is not standing still: our earlier coverage tracked the opening of the Dijkstranet to stake pool operators, and separately the departure of DRep Chris O left some delegators' votes uncounted.

One operator duty sits after the fork. Before Linear Leios can operate, staking pools must complete a BLS key registration procedure, adding a new cryptographic key type to their setup. No mainnet date has been given at any stage of the process. Delegators face no action of their own unless they vote as DReps; anyone choosing a pool for the first time can consult our guide to choosing a staking pool.

Our reading of the sequence is that the testnet reopening moves the workload onto named parties against a calendar that does not exist yet. Intersect owes the node 11.2 pre-release before the hard fork initiation action can go out; DReps, pool operators and the Constitutional Committee owe their ratification once it does; and pools owe BLS key registration before Linear Leios runs on the proof of stake ledger. Every step after October 21 is ordered but unscheduled, so the Dijkstra era now depends less on code being finished than on the ratifying bodies doing their part when the action lands.