StakeNet Terminology

Steward Program: An Anchor program designed to manage the staking authority for a SPL Stake Pool, selecting and managing validators based on performance metrics.

SPL Stake Pool: A Solana program that allows for the creation of stake pools, enabling users to delegate their stake to multiple validators through a single pool and receive a Liquid Staking Token (LST) representing their stake.

Validator History Program: A Solana program that maintains historical performance data for validators. It records and stores various metrics over time on-chain.

Delegation: The amount of stake targeted to a specific validator by the Steward Program.

State Machine: The core logic of the Steward Program that manages different operational states and transitions between them.

Cycle: A period of time (currently 10 epochs) in the Steward Program during which validators are selected and delegations are managed. The scores and validator selections are fixed for the duration of a cycle.

Validator Score: The final score used for delegation eligibility, calculated by multiplying the raw_score by all binary eligibility filters. If any binary criterion fails (returns 0), the validator score becomes 0, making the validator ineligible for delegation.

Raw Score: A 4-tier hierarchical score (64-bit encoded) that ranks validators based on: (1) inflation commission, (2) MEV commission, (3) validator age, and (4) vote credits performance. This score is calculated before binary eligibility filters are applied and is used for determining unstaking priority and ranking validators.

Rebalancing: The process of adjusting stake allocations among validators to maintain desired proportions or react to performance changes.

Instant Unstaking: A process that allows for immediate removal of staked SOL under certain conditions from a validator, bypassing usual rebalancing.

Blacklist: A list of validators that are excluded from receiving delegations through the Steward Program.

Delinquency: A state where a validator is not its duties adequately, often measured by missed vote opportunities. In the context of the Steward Program, this is measured by voting less than a specific threshold in a given epoch.

Epoch Credits: A measure of a validator's performance, representing the number of times it has correctly voted on blocks in a given epoch. Directly impacts validator staking rewards. Also known as Vote Credits.

Commission: The percentage of rewards that a validator keeps for itself before distributing the remainder to its delegators.

Superminority: The highest-staked validators in the network who collectively hold more than 33.3% of the stake.