v1.8.1 is a regular maintenance release
- Added websocket support for web3.js protocol (#3252,#3298)
- Cleaned up protection code for v1.8.0 hard-fork (#3188,#3390,#3436)
- Implemented crash log (#3456)
- Added ChainID metrics (#3438), and multiple API improvements (#3347, #3426, #3484)
- Code refactor and improvements (#3397,#3400,#3404)