HLabs: typescript cardano-node / consensus (node prototype) - NodeJS target runtime relay node

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Michele Nuzzi

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Incorporated)

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

8

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

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

This proposal assumes the approval of the ledger and network proposals, the goal is to build a successful and testable consensus module that can be reused across multiple purpose-specific nodes.

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

Yes

[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.”

The module depends on the successful implementation of the ledger and the network modules.

Even if the three layers are designed to be theoretically indipendent from each other the consensus module will necessarily depend on the two specified above when it comes to testing and actual usage.

This is because the consensus will necessarily require some informations about the data (blocks, txs etc..) in order to make choices and it will necessarily require the networking module in order to receive and forward data to other peers.

Without these dependencies it would be incredibly hard to build a consensus module that can work properly.

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

Yes

[GENERAL] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

The project will be fully open source under Apache-2.0 license.

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution.

The final goal of this proposal is to have the necessary consensus module that can be re-used for different, purpose-specific, nodes; and (alongside the network and ledger proposals) eventually a fully functional alternative implementation of the haskell cardano-node.

The realization of the consensus module will come with a node prototype (meant to testnet use only) thanks the realization of the network and ledger proposals.

Primary target of the project are both developers and stake pool operator, and through them any possible user that interacts, directly or indirectly with the Cardano protocol.

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community.

Client diversity is crucial for the long term security of the protcol.

Every user of Cardano is relying, directly or indirectly, on a cardano-node in order to interact with the blockchain (submitting transactions, querying data, etc...)

So far the only aviable implementation is the Haskell one by IOG, making the node a potential single point of failure, and often accessed via centralized servers (because there is not really an alternative).

This module, alongside the network and ledger ones, will play an important role in the creation of alternative clients and light clients, with the goal of improving the network and end user securtiy.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Michele Nuzzi has been part of the Cardano ecosystem at the beginnign as a single stake pool operator and later as developer. In this time he wrote and still maintains numerous dependecy free typescript libraries that require a low level understanding of the Cardano protocol.

A non-exhaustive list list of some of the projects would be:

• plu-ts: a typescript framework for the creation of Cardano Smart contracts
• plutus-machine: typescript library for the evaluation of contracts off-chain
• cardano-ledger-ts: collection of classes and functions for Cardano specific data types and respective serialization and deserialization in CBOR format.
• ouroboros-miniprotocols-ts: library for low level interactions with the cardano-node based on the ouroboros mini protocols specificaiton.

[Project Milestones] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

mempool

Upstream Peers Adapter*

aka. Connection manager, chain sync and all that stuff

*necessarily dependent on the networking module

ChainDB (Immutable, Volatile, LedgerState)

Chain selection (depends on Milestone 3)

note on the milestones above

most of them are based on the ouroboros-consensus documentation

Deliverables of the proposal are:

1) Typecript ouroboros-consensus module

2) cardano-node prototype*

*The deliverable is strictly dependend on the approval of the ledger and networking proposals

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

1) Michele Nuzzi

• X.com (former Twitter)

In the event multiple proposals will be approved qualified personale will be hired to guarantee the successful delivery of all of the approved proposals.

The profile required for such postion will be of a Senior Typescript developer with solid understanding of the different Javascript runtimes and relative main APIs (Web Workers, WebSockets, etc. for Browsers and worker_threads, os, fs, etc. for Node as well as other possible runtimes such as Bun.js or Deno)

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

At a price of 0.3828 USD per ADA the estimated cost corresponds to roughly 300'940 ADA, so we round down to 300'000 ADA to meet the challenge requirement.

The expected time to completion of the project is of 8 months considering 1 engineer for 8 hours per day for 30 days per month

60 $/h x 8h/d x 30d/mo x 8mo = 115200 $

that converted to ADA is roughly 300'940 ADA (rounded down to meet the challenge requirements)

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

The software generated by this proposal will likely run as part of the critical infrastructure that powers Cardano as a protocol.

The skills and knowledge required for the realization of this project are highly specialized hence the value for money should be fair.

[IMPORTANT NOTE] The Applicant agrees to Fund 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