NeoPRISM - Rust PRISM Node goes to production, supporting wider community use cases

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Pat Losoponkul

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

Individual

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

10

[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)

NeoPRISM is a Rust implementation of PRISM Node. It uses significantly less resource and directly talks to Cardano node using Oura. Substantial work is needed to prepare for the production workload.

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

The project is fully open source under Apache 2 license.

[METADATA] Horizons

Identity & Verification

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution

NeoPRISM is an implementation of PRISM Node that began as a side project with minimal functionality, testing and assurance. It is currently a proof of concept available at https://github.com/patextreme/neoprism and only supports PRISM DID resolution via a WebUI. By adding support for the Universal Resolver API, supporting DID operation publishing and improving its quality assurance, the project moves one step closer to potentially replacing the original PRISM Node in Hyperledger Identus.

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

One of the most critical components in the Hyperledger Identus is the PRISM Node, responsible for indexing and resolving the PRISM DID method. The PRISM DID method specification is publicly available here https://github.com/input-output-hk/prism-did-method-spec/blob/main/w3c-spec/PRISM-method.md. However, the original PRISM Node remains closed-source and is only available as a public Docker image. The future of it becoming open-source is uncertain due to the IOG internal restructuring. While there are some community efforts to implement the specification, these are still in the early days.

By productionizing NeoPRISM, the community can adopt it with confidence as a critical piece in the Hyperledger Identus stack. The original PRISM Node requires multiple components to work together—CardanoNode, DBSync, PRISMNode, and IdentusCloudAgent—to resolve a DID. In contrast, NeoPRISM only requires CardanoNode and NeoPRISM, simplifying adoption for the community and reducing infrastructure costs.

As a proof of concept, the user can quickly run NeoPRISM allowing the first DID to be resolved within minutes!

The image below show an example of NeoPRISM resolution and explorer UI in its current state.

The goal of this proposal is to allow programming interface known as Universal Resolver API and support other use cases such as operation publication to the blockchian. By introducing these features, NeoPRISM is one step closer to replace the original PRISM Node.

[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?

Pat Losoponkul - former Atala's member, engineer who was working closely with PRISM DID specification, implementation and Hyperledger Identus maintainer.

NeoPRISM - a pet project already capable of running and resolving PRISM DID using WebUI that is significantly less resource intensive and easy to spin up. Substantial work is required on this to prepare it for community and production workload.

DID Method implementation is a fairly complex subject and non-trivial involving many of intricacies. Being someone who was working closely with PRISM DID spec and related W3C specs before, and have implemented a POC, the work can start right away without ramping up and familarize with all the specs.

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

Universal Resolver API support

Estimation: 1 month

Objectives:

• Improve interoperability and uniform interface for DID resolution across SSI stack

Key tasks:

• Implement a resolution logic that conforms to the W3C DID Document model following this PRISM spec in this section
• Implement an HTTP binding for DID Resolution according to the DID resolution specification DID resolution specificaition

Acceptance criteria:

• NeoPRISM can be used as a driver for Universal Resolver API to resolve PRISM DID

Enhance project quality and test coverage of NeoPRISM repository

Estimation: 2.5 months

Objectives

• Ensure correctness of resolution logic and DID operation validation logic
• Provide visibility and quality report on implementation correctness, helping support external contribution

Key tasks:

• Add LOTS of tests covering different part of Node implementation including but not limited to: protobuf codec, resolution logic, validation logic, HTTP binding logic
• Write up a documentation site for the Node such as architecture / internal parts and deploy using GitHub pages or equivalent
• Improve project standard in various aspects such as CI/CD, coverage report, release process, contribution guide and other aspect of a good OSS project

Acceptance criteria:

• Unit tests and quality reporting is available in the repository
• Project repository follows general guidelines of OSS
• Public documentation is available and discoverable from the repository

DID operation publication to Cardano blockchain

Estimation: 2.5 months

Objectives:

• Support DID operation publication in Cardano transaction metadata
• Reduce friction to writing DID operation to Cardano

Key tasks:

• Implement a DID operation publication and validation logic

Acceptance criteria:

• NeoPRISM can be used to publish PRISM DID operations
• Tests are implemented the same way as described in Milestone 2
• Documentation are provided the same way as described in Milestone 2

Language agnostic property testing framework

Estimation: 2.5 months

Objectives:

• Enable property testing across different PRISM Node implementation ensuring interoperability
• Provide framework for other implementation to check and validate the correctness

Key tasks:

• Create an RPC (likely gRPC) tests that can be used to test, validate, and assert DID operations read / written by different implementations

Deliverables:

• An implementation of RPC based testing for different PRISM Node implementation
• NeoPRISM is tested against original PRISM Node
• Documentation is provided as described in Milestone 2

Integration with Hyperledger Identus Cloud Agent and close-out report

Estimation: 1 months

Objectives:

• Demonstrate the usefulness of NeoPRISM by integrating with the existing SSI technology
• Offer the alternative stack for Hyperledger Identus Cloud Agent

Key tasks:

• Refactor and contribute to the Hyperledger Identus Cloud Agent repository
• Create a demo video for a close out report of Hyperledger Identus Cloud Agent working with NeoPRISM

Deliverables:

• A working PR to the https://github.com/hyperledger/identus-cloud-agent repo that utilize NeoPRISM
• A demo video

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

Pat Losoponkul - Author and maintainer of NeoPRISM

GitHub1 - https://github.com/patextreme

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

Assume ADA price ~0.36 (on 2024-10-15)

Estimate budget per manday 1000ADA which is approximately $45 / hour

The figure describes the breakdown of each milestone and its budget.

The budgets are:

• M1 - 20000 ADA
• M2 - 50000 ADA
• M3 - 50000 ADA
• M4 - 55000 ADA
• Final - 25000 ADA

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

By having more efficient implementation of PRISM Node, the Hyperledger Identus ecosystem should have significant lower infrastructure cost and staff spending to maintain the entire infrastucture. From prior experience, a Cardano and DB-sync stack can cost weeks of engineers time just to spin up and keep it running. The sever and storage cost is also a big part of the bill to keep the heavy DB-sync infrastucture running.

Images below compare the footprint of both PRISM Node implementation running in container

Original PRISM Node taking more than half a GB on idle and need IdentusCloudAgent to provide resolution endpoint. Not including DB Sync resource.

NeoPRISM running and syncing from Cardano node using a fraction of resource

The lower resource requirement and ease of use should reduce the cost of using Hyperledger Identus and reduce adoption barrier.