SIMD-0196: Migrate Stake to Core BPF

proposals/0196-migrate-stake-to-core-bpf.md

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+---
+simd: '0196'
+title: Migrate Stake to Core BPF
+authors:
+  - Hanako Mumei
+category: Standard
+type: Core
+status: Review
+created: 2024-11-14
+feature: (fill in with feature tracking issues once accepted)
+---
+
+## Summary
+
+Migrate the Stake program to Core BPF.
+
+## Motivation
+
+BPF programs offer less complexity than native programs for other clients, such
+as Firedancer, since developers will no longer have to keep up with program
+changes in their runtime implementations. Instead, the program can just be
+updated once.
+
+In this spirit, the Stake program should be migrated to Core BPF.
+
+## Alternatives Considered
+
+The Stake program could instead remain a builtin program. This would mean each
+validator client implementation would have to build and maintain this program
+alongside their runtime, including any future changes.
+
+## New Terminology
+
+N/A.
+
+## Detailed Design
+
+The Stake program will be reimplemented in order to be compiled to BPF and
+executed by the BPF loader.
+
+The reimplemented program's ABI will exactly match that of the original.
+
+The reimplemented program's functionality will exactly match that of the
+original, differing only in compute usage. Instead it will have dynamic compute
+usage based on the VM's compute unit meter.
+
+The program will be migrated to Core BPF using the procedure outlined in
+[SIMD 0088](./0088-enable-core-bpf-programs.md).
+
+The program will have no upgrade authority. If changes are required, for
+essential network operations, the program will be updated using feature-gates.
+
+## Impact
+
+Validator client teams are no longer required to implement and maintain the
+Stake program within their runtime.
+
+All validator client teams can work to maintain the single Stake program
+together.
+
+## Security Considerations
+
+The program's reimplementation poses no new security considerations compared to
+the original builtin version.
+
+The greatest security concern is a mistake in the reimplementation.
+
+## Backwards Compatibility
+
+The Core BPF implementation is 100% backwards compatible with the original
+builtin implementation.