Implementing Hydra Heads: the first step towards the full Hydra vision

The Hydra Head, the first in a suite of protocols, is an important element of Cardano’s scaling journey. Let’s see how it fits into the bigger picture. And maybe bust some myths

3 February 2022 Matthias Benkort 12 mins read

 Implementing Hydra Heads: the first step towards the full Hydra vision

We’ve done the science and the theory. We have laid the foundations for a scalable, versatile, and high-throughput blockchain. Now it’s time for steady growth and system enhancements. With the goal of creating an optimized ecosystem to support and foster decentralized applications (DApps) development, Cardano is in the foothills of the Basho phase. With smart contracts already…

Introducing pipelining: Cardano's consensus layer scaling solution

Pipelining is one of the key scaling improvements to be deployed in 2022. Here’s how it works and why it matters

1 February 2022 John Woods 4 mins read

Introducing pipelining: Cardano's consensus layer scaling solution

You’d be forgiven for thinking that pipelining sounds like a remodelling procedure a plumber might employ. In a way, this isn’t too far from the truth. Pipelining is, effectively, an evolution in Cardano’s ‘plumbing’. It is a key element in our scaling plan this year, one in the series of published steps covering our methodical approach to flex Cardano’s capacity as the…

Simple property-based tests for Plutus validators

How to write off-chain code with the 'cooked-validators' library and get property-based tests for free

27 January 2022 Victor Cacciari Miraldo 8 mins read

Simple property-based tests for Plutus validators

We recently heard from Victor Miraldo, who leads the smart contract verification and auditing team at Tweag, about the importance of verification for security reasons in the world of decentralized finance (DeFi). Victor is a Haskell and formal methods engineer committed to ensuring the safety and correctness of decentralized apps (DApps) through tools and processes. In this…

Plutus fee estimator: find out the cost of transacting on Cardano

Our new fee estimator – released today – will help developers estimate the cost of smart contract scripts for maximum efficiency and minimum cost

21 January 2022 Kevin Hammond 6 mins read

Plutus fee estimator: find out the cost of transacting on Cardano

The ‘Alonzo’ smart contract upgrade deployed to the Cardano mainnet in September 2021 turned Cardano into a functional platform for the development of decentralized applications (DApps) built in Plutus.

With the Cardano ecosystem steadily growing, a great number of DApps are being built and readied for launch on Cardano. Either in final testing, deployment, or active development, Cardano will soon host a variety of DApps covering DeFi

The beating heart of a fast-growing network

At the core of the Cardano network lies the node. Here’s how this integral technology will play its part as we scale Cardano during 2022

19 January 2022 John Woods 5 mins read

The beating heart of a fast-growing network

In a recent post, we discussed our methodical approach to preparing Cardano for its expected growth over the coming weeks and months. As more and more decentralized applications make Cardano their home, and as the decentralized finance (DeFi) and ‘RealFi’ ecosystem expands and evolves, the blockchain needs to be able to perform accordingly.

Cardano is entering the Basho phase with a focus on optimization, scaling, and network growth. We anticipate a significant increase in transactional traffic over the months ahead, and here’s where we start the process of flexing to meet this. Improvements to the core node are part of this and we have packed node v1.33.0 full of new features and improvements to existing elements, upping…