Develop Web3.js in feature parity with Solana

[buffalojoec]

Motivation

The Solana protocol uses Feature Gates to make consensus-breaking changes to the protocol. Often, these changes have downstream effects on Web3.js (examples: solana-labs/solana-web3.js#2013, solana-labs/solana-web3.js#2101).

It would benefit our development workflow greatly to have some semblance of feature parity with the Solana protocol, possibly by leveraging these feature IDs in Web3.js.

Ideas

We could do this a number of ways:

• Introduce build steps for bootstrapping either a pre- or post- feature activation change in a client bundle.
• Rely on RPC calls to query feature status in order to control functionality (yuck).
• Leverage feature IDs and the Feature Activation Schedule to manage development branches and subsequent releases.

We should discuss further!