Digital CV listing globally verifiable certifications

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Asterios Bakavos

[GENERAL] Email address of main applicant

istovatis@gmail.com

Additional applicants

Fragkiskos Chatziasimidis,

Michael Karasavvas

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

6

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language.

No

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

No

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.” .

No dependencies.

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

Yes

[GENERAL] If NO, please describe which outputs are not going to be open source. If YES, please write “Project will be fully open source.”

Project will be fully open source.

[METADATA] Category of Proposal

dApp

[METADATA] SDG rating

SDG Goals

4 - Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all

8 - Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all

10 - Reduce inequality within and among countries

16 - Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels

SDG Subgoals

16.10 - Ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation and international agreements

16.5 - Substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all their forms

16.6 - Develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels

4.4 - By 2030, substantially increase the number of youth and adults who have relevant skills, including technical and vocational skills, for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

Problem

Acquiring a diploma or obtaining a skill is a tough process demanding effort, time, and money. The verification of those achievements is proven by the issuing institutions. In the case of e-learning platforms, there is usually a publication id and a URL pointing to the certification. In the majority of universities, the verification is acquired only by raising a question to the university itself. This costly and time-consuming process leads to a situation where the authenticity is not self-proven, damaging all sides participating:

• Institutions need to implement and maintain a certification verification process
• Certificate holders do not have a single place of truth, where all acquired certifications are verified
• Employers or public services that demand the certifications need money and time to verify their authenticity and are simultaneously suspicious of their authenticity.

Solution

Lifelong learning is a reality. The importance to have a spot where everyone can verify the authenticity of the diplomas and certifications is a concern of the institutions, the people that struggle to accomplish them, and those that need to make sure that those certificates are authentic.

Here comes our platform

We are the bond between the institutions and the learners. Upon certificate/diploma completion, the learner can acquire the verified certification. Users must complete information that serves as identity (for example an email or a public Cardano address that will receive the certification). In the case of email, if there is no Cardano wallet connected to this email, we will create a Cardano wallet on behalf of this user.

The institute will then send us the certification and we will upload it to a IPFS service. We will then leverage the power of the Cardano Smart contracts and the Cardano Native Assets support to mint an NFT representing the certification. If the requirements are met the certification will be transferred from the issuer to the user. Under the hood, we will create a web page for every user, which acts as a digital CV.

This page will show every certification that this user has acquired in a legit way. This is the digital CV of the user, which holds all verified certificates and serves as a globally verified CV. It can be presented to anyone interested, for example, employers or public services. Since the acquirement of the certification is represented by a blockchain transaction, everyone can verify the authenticity of this, by crosschecking among others, the issuer's public address and the policy_id.

The cost of publishing a certification to the blockchain, which is actually the NFT minting and transferring to the holder's wallet will be either carried by the institute or the end user. The latter case demands a smart contract that locks the ADA needed and the NFT and releases them only when the acquiring user has the necessary amount of ADA to obtain the NFT.

We are in discussions with both e-learning platforms and local universities to make this a reality, targeting real needs and providing a viable solution.

[IMPACT] How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?

Those are the main sectors that the Cardano will benefit from:

1. Transparency: The platform will be open source, allowing the Cardano community to follow the progress of the proposed solution
2. Collaboration and teamwork: Our vision is to be part of a world where collaboration is over competition. As such, we are open to bright minds and ideas.
3. Adoption: This is a case that affects millions of users and thousands of institutes. Cardano will gain by expanding a whole pool of new users.

[IMPACT] How do you intend to measure the success of your project?

Aim 1: Make it reality

Craftmanship is at our core, so our primary goal is to have a solution that works. This means that is stable, easy adoptable and cost effective.

Aim 2: Involve the community

Having accomplished this, we want to share it with the communality. We will be more than happy to see this forked starred and shared.

Aim 3: Bring it to the people

We are building software that solves real world problems. Adoption by the educational community is the key of success. Discussions with e-learning platforms and academic institutes will be held in parallel with the platform development.

[IMPACT] Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?

1. Open source repository: A public repository in the Github will depict the development process that is taken by our team.
2. Documentation: Clear and descriptive documentation will give a clear notion of our modules, their capabilities and their communication
3. Public announcements: We will post our latest news on Cardano forums and social channels.

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability?

We are a team of developers with at least 10 years of experience in software. Our formation is composed of both Back End and Front End developers which enables us to deliver fully working software.

Our entrepreneurial endeavor started with Pickslot, a software that provides appointment scheduling. We are privileged to be engaged in all levels of development, and thus we have a holistic notion of what it needs to bring an idea to life.

As engineers, we are experienced in all levels of development, from the initial vision and ideation to cloud deployment(AWS and Microsoft Azure) and CI/CD.

Although we haven't developed any dApp in Cardano yet, we are enthusiasts about the Cardano principles and foundations. In this aspect, we are constantly following the achievements of the Cardano ecosystem. Our academic involvement with Blockchain technology goes back to 2014. Μελέτη Στόχευσης Χρήσης και Ανάλυση Οικονομικής Δραστηριότητας στο Δίκτυο Συναλλαγών του Bitcoin - IKEE / Aristotle University of Thessaloniki - Library (auth.gr)

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What are the main goals for the project and how will you validate if your approach is feasible?

Platform

Develop an open-source platform that is dived into segments: The first one is to enable the user to acquire the verified certification upon course/diploma/challenge completion. The latter one is to have a web page where all those verified certifications are listed. The solution must be robust, cost-effective and easily used.

Investigation

One primary aspect of the investigation is to search for other projects in the Cardano ecosystem that provide the functionality we are trying to build. For example the integration with the https://www.nmkr.io/ to create an NFT and interact with the wallet.

We also want to investigate the crossmint which already provides a remarkable portion of our functionality, but for the time being, not fully for the Cardano.

How to achieve them?

The team

Even the greatest idea can fail because of the people. Our primary asset is our team. We have collaborated on many projects for years, we know what to expect from the other teammate and how to communicate it.

The concept

The level of complication of the main idea plays a significant role in the feasibility of the product. As such we take extra care to define something that can work. Our idea of a digital CV with verified certificates is well understood. We have ditched unnecessary features and we have ended up with a project with well-defined starting and ending points.

Investigation

We will not reinvent the wheel if unnecessary. The investigation comes before development. Continuous research for other projects that can provide the functionality we need can save us time and help us build more robust software.

The Development process

Having divided the concept into pieces, we can assign each piece to the most fitting member of the team. We provide guidance and feedback on daily basis, keeping the development process efficient.

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed breakdown of your project’s milestones and each of the main tasks or activities to reach the milestone plus the expected timeline for the delivery.

Milestone 1: Project Initiation, Solution Design, Architecture, and Identity (Month 1)

This kickoff phase includes legal and accountant tasks, Architectural designs, and Brand/Identity.

For the Brand/Identity, we will need to collaborate with a Graphic designer partner.

Milestone 2: Development of the Backend services (Months 2,3) 

NFT minting module:

We will build a Backend service that will connect to cardano-cli. The cardano-cli will connect to a running and synced cardano-node.

The purpose of this module is to mint the NFT and bind it with appropriate metadata, such as the issuer name, publication date, holder's name, etc.

New Wallet generation module

This service will keep a wallet per every certification issuer and certification receiver. For newly generated wallets, it will connect to the cardano-wallet.

IPFS uploader module

The input of this service is the image representing the certification. The IPFS uploader, as the name suggests, will upload the image to the IPFS.

Identity manager

Users must place a Cardano address or an email to receive the certification. 

When the input is a Cardano address, the Smart Contract analyzed below will be executed.

When the input is an email, the user must place the credentials to register/login. For new users, we will generate a wallet by calling the New Wallet generation module.

Having a wallet for the given email, we will proceed with the execution of the Smart Contract given below.

We will also investigate any potential adoption of Cardano SSI platforms, such as Atala Prism or 

"Certification Receiver" Smart Contract

This Smart Contract is responsible to send the Certification NFT to the user that has granted it.

Transaction cost analysis

To transfer the certification from the issuing organization to the user, some amount of ADA must be paid.

Those are The Min-Ada Value, the Cardano network fees, and the middleware fees.

• Min-Ada value: Will be sent from the issuer to the user
• Cardano network fees: Will be paid by either issuer or user, depending on the final contract we will settle with the issuers.
• Middleware fees: A certain fee we will be paid that will allow us to maintain our deployable systems and further expand our product.

Milestone 3: Development of the Frontend services (Month 4) 

NFT preview page:

React JS module that previews the NFT (image, details, etc). This page will also show the input (email/Cardano address) that the user must give.

Login page:

In the case of email, the user must give the credentials to proceed.

Digital CV page:

A page that will list all verified certificates that this user has received from our connected issuers.

Milestone 4: Support of FIAT payments (Month 5) 

Our consideration is to provide a service that every user, even those that haven't heard of the Cardano or Blockchain before, can use.

In this direction, we will provide a way for the user to pay with FIAT by using a debit/credit card.

Milestone 5: Deployment and Integration Testing (Month 6) 

Having built all those components, the final step is the CI/CD and the final tests (both integration and End-To-End)

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please describe the deliverables, outputs and intended outcomes of each milestone.

Milestone 1: Project Initiation, Solution Design, Architecture and Identity

Deliverables:

• Topology diagram that will present every component participating in the project and the components that is connected to.
• Communication Diagrams for user cases that involve different components.
• Initial presentation of the project's Identity.

Outputs: Topoloy and communication diagrams. 

Intended Outcomes: A well structured architectural analysis that will give the general view of the system by declaring fine grained components.

Milestone 2: Development of the Backend services

Deliverables: Several Backend services:

• NFT minting
• New Wallet generation
• IPFS uploader
• Identity manager

Outputs: An operational minting service, a wallet management service, an IPFS uploader service and an Identity management service.

Intended Outcomes: A BackeEnd infrastructure capable of performing the majority of tasks needed for the project.

Milestone 3: Development of the Frontend services

Deliverables: A Front End service implemented in some JS Framework, such as Angular JS.

Outputs: BackEnd is now connected to the FrontEnd.

Intended Outcomes: We have a holistic user experience. Our system can be validated and tested now.

Milestone 4: Support of FIAT payments

Deliverables: A Back End module that accepts payments and proceeds to the smart contract execution.

Outputs: User can now pay in FIAT

Intended Outcomes: Fully operational system easy accesibled by everyone.

Milestone 5: Deployment and Integration Testing

Deliverables:

• Pipelines that perform the continuous build and deployment of both BackEnd and FrontEnd components.
• Integration tests that verify the correct operation of the system.

Outputs: CI/CD procedures

Intended Outcomes: Our project is finally on rails. Every new change is tested and deployed to the production.

[RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

Milestone 1: Project Initiation, Solution Design, Architecture, and Identity (Duration: 4 Weeks)

• 1 Project Manager for 24h/week at 40$/h = $3,840
• 1 Senior Software Engineer for 16h/week at 50$/h = $3,200
• 1 Graphic Designer for 32h/week at 30$/h = $3,840

Milestone 1 budget: $10,880

Milestone 2: Development of the Backend services (Duration: 8 Weeks) 

• 1 Project Manager for 16h/week at 40$/h = $5,120
• 1 Senior Software Engineer for 40h/week at 50$/h = $16,000

Milestone 2 budget: $21,120

Milestone 3: Development of the Frontend services (Duration: 4 Weeks)

• 1 Project Manager for 16h/week at 40$/h = $2,560
•  1 Senior Software Engineer for 40h/week at 50$/h = $8,000

Milestone 3 budget: $10,560

Milestone 4: Support of FIAT payments (Duration: 4 Weeks) 

• 1 Project Manager for 6h/week at 40$/h = $960
• 1 Senior Software Engineer for 40h/week at 50$/h = $8,000

Milestone 4 budget: $8,960

Milestone 5: Deployment and Integration Testing (Duration: 4 Weeks) 

• 1 Project Manager for 6h/week at 40$/h = $960
• 1 Senior Software Engineer for 40h/week at 50$/h = $8,000

Milestone 5 budget: $8,960

Infrastructure budget: $1,000

Development budget: $60,480

Total budget in $: $61,480

Total budget in ₳ at 0.3$/₳: ₳204,933

[RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

Cardano is a brave new world based on solid scientific foundations. Now is the time to promote Cardano as a general-use and easily adaptable solution. This is the place for teams like us and projects like ours. We want to bind the Cardano with the institutes and educational organizations and propose a solution that everyone, from the institutes to companies benefits.

We will investigate other projects within the Cardano ecosystem that we can use. There is an opportunity to contribute to the ecosystem by setting partnerships with other Cardano projects.

Finally, we will deliver an open source project, setting the pathway for other projects with the same direction to follow.

[IMPORTANT NOTE] The Applicant agreed to Fund10 rules and also that data in the Submission Form and other data provided by the project team during the course of the project will be publicly available.

I Accept