DeFi Infrastructure & Dev Tooling

Over the last few years in particular, we have witnessed an exponential growth of dApps developed as a result of the Ethereum blockchain, each with a different purpose. Most of them originated in finance, or rather, DeFi.

In order to facilitate this rapid development, various infrastructures have been created around the ecosystem represented by a growing number of players who are populating the Ethereum blockchain.

The entire infrastructure can be supported by various elements ranging from platforms created with the sole purpose of informing the community, to protocols built to provide external entities with open API forms aimed at calling up a certain function or at direct connection with another platform, a DEX for example.

Others, on the other hand, are specialized in offering a specific service designed to facilitate and make certain processes more efficient.

EthHub is an environment open to all those who need information of various kinds related to everything that the Ethereum blockchain can offer to the system around it. Born from a collaboration with GitHub, to date is probably the largest information system for dApps in existence.

The primary objective of EthHub is to provide a single place that is able to represent a reliable source of information related to the Ethereum world. In an attempt to achieve this goal, three different main dissemination tools are used: various documents, podcasts and a weekly newsletter, all related to the EthHub platform.

In addition, there is also a section dedicated to the entire ecosystem which has been created to date, providing a set of rules and advice on how to create a project, according to the context in which it will be placed.

The list is long since there are many different types of decentralized applications that can be developed on Ethereum; these include decentralized finance, decentralized exchanges, marketplaces, oracles, blockchain games, tools for developers of various types and much more.

0x is an open-source protocol and infrastructure that is mainly used by developers and companies to create products that support the purchase and exchange of ERC20 and ERC721 tokens.

This protocol actually enables the peer-to-peer exchange of all types of assets tokenized on the Ethereum blockchain, ranging from video game items to financial instruments.

The major advantages that 0x brings within decentralized applications are mainly related to the APIs it offers, the core business of the platform.

In fact, it is possible to have access to the liquidity of all DEXs by easily integrating only one API; in this way the platform will interact with a certain amount of aggregate liquidity from different decentralized exchanges such as Kyber, Uniswap, Oasis and 0x Mesh.

This way the 0x API will be able to find the best price to buy a token for example, thanks to what is called “smart order”. This term refers to the process of splitting a transaction through the DEX network, so that it is then filled with the lowest possible cost found on the network at that precise moment.

Finally, as already mentioned, there is a tool that can improve the efficiency and scalability of any decentralized application that implements its use in its payment system.

We are talking about Connext, an infrastructure that with its layer stands between the Ethereum blockchain and any wallet, browser and dApp that enables its technology based on the State Channel, which can greatly simplify interactions on the blockchain.

Thanks to State Channels it is possible to group different transactions in an off-chain channel by depositing and blocking a certain amount of assets to be exchanged. This process takes place through the use of a multisignature contract that allows the participants of the open channel to execute all the transactions they want, paying attention to the total amount initially deposited.

Once the interactions are over, the most recent status of the channel and therefore of the final balances will be uploaded on the blockchain, thus updating the public ledger, where all the nodes of the network will be able to see only the opening and closing transaction of the channel.

The whole process can be illustrated and detailed through a simple example using a chess game, where all the moves are recorded in the state channel and the final result will be transferred to the blockchain once the match is finished.

This process is capable of significantly increasing the effectiveness of the network by allowing instant and very low cost exchanges.

Undoubtedly, the current information systems and platforms offering different tools are vital for the sustainable development of decentralized applications; each piece of the puzzle will be fundamental to bring the blockchain into everyone’s life.