In a world of smart contract enabled blockchains – designed for NFTs, DeFi, DAOsthe entire kaleidoscope of blockchain experiments—Ethereum is OG, but it is expensive and slow to use.
Solana is the already aging upstart, faster and angrier, but prone to overpromising and occasionally stalling.
In 2019, Meta (née Facebook) tried its hand at a blockchain, Libra (later renamed Diem), but it was ultimately rejected in the face of opposition from regulators.
So the issues remain: How do you build a blockchain that is decentralized, secure and fast? Is it possible? Inevitably, successful implementation of one of these variables comes at the expense of another.
Still, the developers behind Aptos believe they have the answer in an experimental transaction ordering algorithm that is the successor to the Diem experiment.
What is Aptos?
Aptos is very new to the scene. The recipient of a $150 million funding round led by FTX and investors including Parafi in late July, the fast blockchain received an additional $200 million strategic round from major players such as Andreessen Horowitz, Multicoin Capital and Haun Ventures in March.
Founded by Avery Ching and Mo Shaik, who worked on Diem’s Novi wallet, Aptos uses a technique outlined in the Diem days called “parallel execution” (of which more later) that claims to increase transaction speeds while keeping them cheap.
Like another project, Sui, it bills itself as the inheritor of Diem’s legacy, and uses the blockchain’s proprietary programming language, Move.
It’s generating a decent buzz, even though it doesn’t yet have a token and has only raised money from venture firms.
Questions remain about how different Aptos is from other blockchains, whether “parallel execution” works as promised, and how the new blockchain can muster a large enough ecosystem of programmers willing to learn the relatively unknown programming language.
How does Aptos work?
As mentioned, Aptos’ key feature is parallel execution. Most blockchains use a method of ordering transactions called sequential or serial execution, where a single chronology of transactions is continuously updated: every time you trade or buy something, that transaction is added to a single long ledger containing every transaction ever done. on the network and updated via thousands of nodes.
Because they are all added one at a time, it is necessary to wait for each new transaction to be verified: this takes a long time and is the reason for the icy settlement speed of most blockchains.
Parallel execution, on the other hand, runs multiple concurrent chains in, well, parallel, so that – theoretically – several can be processed at once. In fact, Aptos claims that their testnets have already hit 130,000 transactions per second; compare that to Ethereum’s more leisurely 30 per second.
Is Aptos reliable?
We don’t know yet: Parallel execution is controversial. Whatever benefits it brings to efficiency, it can come at the cost of security. “Sequential” blockchains are the way they are for a reason: Relying on a single chronology of transactions makes it easier to check the chain’s contents against itself; there is only one place a transaction can go.
Introducing parallel chains complicates things. With multiple chains, it is more difficult to get a full view of the transaction history, and transactions may attempt to process through multiple chains simultaneously, causing them to fail (as well as enticing opportunists to attempt a fraudulent “double spend”).
Aptos’ solution is to wait until the transaction dust has settled and verify all chains at once: sufficiently placed transactions will go through, while unsuccessful ones will be “re-executed.”
It’s a policy of execute first, ask questions later – and it seems to be working.
Who builds on Aptos?
- 💱 Pontem network – a project that builds Apto’s first decentralized exchange.
- 👾 Mars DAO – a decentralized autonomous organization that builds Aptos’ digital wallet.
What is Aptos’ future?
Since its launch, Apto’s critics have wondered whether its developers can overcome the stigma of having worked at the multinational formerly known as Facebook.
The record suggests yes: Aptos says it has incorporated many of the projects involved with Libra into its ecosystem, and seems happy to build exclusively in Aptos’ relatively untested programming language.
The prestige and experience of Apto’s founders seems to have attracted new developers as well: Apto’s Discord already has over 63,000 members, of which around 8,000 are developers, and the protocol is supported by over 20,000 nodes.
Aptos also recently completed a testnet update, and a mainnet launch is expected later this year. However, the token will not be available in the US for regulatory reasons.
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