Ergo Platform Monthly Wrap Up: June
Welcome back to the Ergo Ecosystem monthly update! This newsletter aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the progress made by various projects in the Ergo ecosystem month-by-month to help you keep on track with the rapidly expanding Ergo ecosystem.
ErgoVersary
July 1st marked Ergo’s fourth anniversary and to celebrate we hosted a jam-packed summit with tons of great videos from various parts of the ecosystem and beyond. Check out the full playlist on Youtube!
Hodlcoin
Holdcoin was a concept thought up by one of the designers of Djed (SigmaUSD). The game has simple rules: players can HODL their ERGs by depositing them into a common reserve or un-HODL by burning their HODL ERGs to withdraw ERGs from the reserve. When HODLing, there are no fees, but un-HODLing incurs a penalty fee (e.g., 3% or 10%) that remains in the common reserve. Players who continue to HODL benefit from the fees paid by un-HODLing players, creating an incentive to hold for longer.
Yes. It dates back to 2020, actually. :-). I was trying to simplify the design of Djed/SigmaUSD, to try to come up with a stablecoin protocol that would need no reservecoin and no oracle. 😄 And then I ended up with hodlCoin. But I dismissed it back then as something crazy (which it is, if your goal is to create a stablecoin, since hodlERG's price only increases :-D)... 🙂 Then, in summer/autumn of 2022, I shared this idea with @kushti_ru and, in Spring of 2023, he convinced me that this would be an interesting DegenFi product. The collaboration with @pulsarzz started then and I am still amazed by how fast it all went from there. Ergo's capacity for innovation is incredible.
Unfortunately in the haste and secrecy, a vulnerability was introduced that allowed the bank box to be drained. Superstar of the month, Krasavice Blasen, the developer behind Duckpools and SkyHarbor spotted this mistake and quickly drained the funds to prevent a malicious actor from doing so. A more detailed technical description of the flaw is described in this Reddit post. The funds are now being returned to the users and a v2 of Hodlcoin is underway with PhoenixErgo. This is being worked on by known community developers MGpai and lgd who are redoing the contract and using a proxy contract to further improve security.
Reiterating the importance of knowing your assumptions. There are no guarantees in experimental decentralised finance. Time is always the best measure of a protocols reliability. Manage your risks and trade well.
Emission Reduction (July 10th)
The next emission reduction will happen approximately around July 10th. This will bring the reward per block down to 36 ERG/block. Down from 39 ERG/block. This will realise Ergo’s first halving from the initial block rewards at genesis. ( 75 ERG/block).
These reductions will continue at minus 3 ERG / block every three months until we quickly reach and block reward of 3 ERG/block by April 2026.
Storage Rent (July 20th)
Storage rent on Ergo will begin in around July 20th. There are box consolidation tools in both Nautilus and Ergo Mobile Wallet (Terminus) now. This video thread will help you be prepared to avoid losing your assets.
It appears from on-chain analysis there is roughly about 30,000 ERG to be collected, with half of that coming from native assets. (i,e: SigmaUSD or NETA in a UTXO without enough ERG to cover rent.)
There is a great 3-part series tracking the storage rent potential on Reddit.
An important aspect kushti pointed out recently:
“Actually, storage rent is helping with pruning also. That is, all the utxos are no more than 4 years old, then any wallet or app would be functional with having only blocks no older than 4 years. Blocks beyond 4 years in the past would be needed only for blockchain history analysis.”
Infrastructure
Reference Client - UTXO Set Snapshots (July 11th)
The Reference Client has made significant strides this month. Version 5.0.12 was released, introducing support for UTXO set bootstrapping. This feature enhances the efficiency of the client by allowing it to bootstrap from a UTXO set rather than downloading the entire blockchain. These will be available for bootstrapping at block 1,044,480.
Oracles
The Oracles project has been busy with various updates and improvements. They added a feature to track the number of active Oracles and set up monitoring tools like Prometheus and Grafana. They released new versions of the Oracle Core and made enhancements to the metrics, including tracking the total number of Oracle tokens. They also worked on presentations and fixed issues with missing data points. Testing was conducted for different functionalities such as voting and pool top-ups. Watch the Oracle Pool v2 | greenhat | Ergoversary Summit 2023 presentation.
Rosen Bridge
Rosen Bridge has been working on improving abstraction by adding generic types to the abstract chain network, fixing debug in the get mean pool box mapping function, and adding APIs to the project. The team has also started the refactoring phase for the front-end projects and is working on APIs, observation events, and withdrawal APIs. They hope to launch in the coming weeks! In collaboration with ZenGate they have just announced a new SPO revenue stream securing bridges SPO for Project Catalyst proposals for Fund10
DeFi
DexyGold
The DexyGold testnet is close approaching, kushti released a video during the summit, explaining the mechanisms behind the new Dexy stablecoin and how it offers a simple alternative to other stablecoin designs.
Duckpools
Over the past few weeks, Duckpools has been actively working on enhancing its security measures and conducting thorough testing. They underwent a security audit, which led to some minor changes in their contracts. They also created a checklist of tests to ensure comprehensive testing before private testing. During this period, they encountered a minor problem with larger contract values but quickly resolved it. They completed the testing tasks outlined in the security audit and focused on setting up the service and addressing minor UI issues. They started testing the proxy contracts to analyze their behavior in unexpected scenarios. Private testing is now underway, and they have been diligently preparing the UI for this phase. The testing will be conducted and discussed within the community on Discord.
Machina Finance
Machina Finance is a decentralized order-based exchange for the Ergo Blockchain, the focus is off-chain bots to optimize volume, trading, and arbitrage. This month fixed a bug in their initial function and introduced a mock chain package. They have also tested and added an abstract Bank calculations class. Contract specifications are currently being written and discussed, marking important steps in the development of Machina Finance.
Our goal is simple.
Replace the machine with an open p2p exchange empowered by local smart contracts, and trade bots.
Power to the user.
Grand Gambit
Grand Gambit has been active with several updates. The Bass token was listed and the weekly free token series continued, contributing to a total of around 22,000 transactions.
GuapSwap
GuapSwap released its whitepaper and is making progress on its V2 by learning from other projects. They have launched a new website and are currently running a mainnet testnet. The team has been refactoring and integrating new contracts from Spectrum. This allows them to rewrite contracts for a more flexible architecture that can support future feature additions without affecting existing functionality.
SigmaFi
SigmaFi updated the Plasma toolkit to app kit 5.0.3 and continued work on Auto Liquidation contracts.
Exle
Back-end work for Exle has been completed, with only front-end integration remaining to connect the updated back end with Nautilus. This progress brings Exle closer to its goal of providing an integrated and seamless user experience. See this article to see what they have been up to recently in Kenya: Empowering Communities: Interest-Free Loans Drive Economic Growth for Kenyan Cooperative
Spectrum
Spectrum Finance has been making progress on different fronts and has diligently been working on its ADA mainnet launch. They completed the diffusion protocol implementation and are now working on the implementation of a verifiable random number generator. They have also been testing Sigma aggregations and introduced a lottery function for selecting committees. Additionally, they integrated broadcasting into the aggregation flow for better consistency and fault tolerance. The team is focused on interoperability and working on building an authenticated storage system. They also hosted a Twitter space with CardanoSpot where they discuss what we are currently up to and our future path forward!
Analog Ergo
Analog Ergo aims to use cryptographic primitives (well-established, low-level algorithms) as the basis for a cross-chain peer-to-peer marketplace and has made significant progress in its development. They completed decoding registers from receiver claim transactions and are now working on the initiator claim with decoded register values. They conducted successful tests using a custom GUI and shared updates on the Analog Ergo Discord channel. They implemented a custom gas fee option and refund lock time checking. Work is still ongoing on EVM refund scripts. They are also improving the GUI and planning a video demo. It’s great to see this project steadily advancing toward its goals each week!
anetaBTC
Join Frosty as he reflects on Ergo and anetaBTC. His project will allow for wrapped Bitcoin to live on Ergo and Cardano in the near future!
Paideia
Paideia has made significant progress in its development and is nearing its MVP launch! Recent updates have included creating staking endpoints and integrating staking into the front end. They also integrated proposal and voting functionalities into the back end. They upgraded to the latest app kit version and implemented a notification system for staking transactions. The team is now working on finalizing the core governance functionality and handling proposal voting on the front end.
Thz.fm
Back with a plethora of updates, check their latest dev update for more information
ZenGate
This month ZenGate announced they were partnering with 01x, a leading force in the DeFi space known for their expertise in tokenomics. As usual, they host regular Community AMA & updates on Twitter Spaces. The team has been busy on the technical side. They've reviewed the protocol, studied existing traceability solutions, and updated the protocol based on their research. They've also estimated the transaction costs within the protocol. Now, they've finished the front-end development and are working on contracts for Palmyra ComDEX.
CruxFinance
Crux Finance aims to attract new users to powerfully expressive blockchains by providing an intuitive, visually appealing, and user-friendly platform that offers access to the bustling Ergo ecosystem using a single interface. An aspect imperative to wider adoption is simplicity. This ethos rests at the forefront of the overarching goal of Crux Finance. Their litepaper is now live and they recently hosted an Introduction on Twitter Spaces.
EgalCoin
A whitepaper draft for Egalcoin: A Peer-to-peer Electronic Monetary System was teased on Twitter.
SigmaGold
Bruno Woltzenlogel Paleo talks us through the new stablecoin protocol design, Gluon W±, which takes its inspiration from liquidity pools and nuclear physics.
Gaming
Blitz TCG
Blitz TCG recently redesigned a portion of the card token burning and Blitz token emission protocol. The team is actively refactoring the off-chain code to complete the setup phase of the card-burning game token emission protocol. They are currently working on the off-chain code and preparing to start the transactions this week.
ErgoGames
ErgoGames provided a quick update on RoboGames, one of their exciting projects. More details are expected in the coming weeks.
Tooling
ergexplorer
ergexplorer’s raffle was successfully funded! They made several updates including smart contract transaction summaries, NFT previews in token address views, added token icons, search improvements, token search by name, advanced token search options by filter, and sorting.
ErgoNames
ErgoNames is actively addressing front-running issues and finalizing the UI and UX design. They are making significant progress in developing the contracts and finishing up the database, paving the way for an improved user experience on the ErgoNames platform.
BitDomains
BitDomains, another domain name service in the development on Ergo continued work on their contracts, refactoring to use the reservation so activate pattern, and working on contract changes to allow wallets to recover usernames from the fresh wallet restore easier.
TabbyPOS
TabbyPOS is currently focusing on developing a point-of-sale system that incorporates ERG. This integration will provide users with a seamless payment solution within the TabbyPOS platform. Check out the TabbyPOS | Ergoversary Summit 2023 presentation for more information.
Koinly
Thanks to the valiant efforts of Noah and the rest of the community, Koinly beta integration is now live and open to feedback.
Ergo Tizen
SigmaPrism sat down with Ross Weir, the developer behind the 1st place winning project: Ergo Tizen -- to learn more about what motivated him to build this, why on Ergo, and why should people care about it.
ErgoTutorials
ErgoTutorials has been updated with the latest translations, making it more accessible to a global audience. The team is planning to work on new translations after exams, further expanding the reach of these valuable resources.
Fleet SDK
Fleet SDK has finally moved out of the alpha phase. The team has improved the output Builder with set additional registers type safety and strengthened supply chain security and verifiable packages with improved CI workflow and the npm prominence.
FleetSharp achieved two important milestones. They developed an ERP 12 connector to seamlessly integrate FleetSharp in the Blazor WebAssembly. Additionally, they successfully submitted the first transaction through Nautilus.
uexplorer
uexplorer has been adjusted to operate without any external database. All essential data is now persisted in an embedded MV store all within a single JVM process. The team is currently working on extending the data model.
Sigma
Sigma released version 5.0.8, upgraded the Ergo node to use Sigma 5.0.8 and tested full node sync with the Sigma version 5.0.8 release candidate. The release candidate 5.0.9 is ready for review and includes erp5 contract template implementation.
Nautilus
Nautilus released version 0.0.8.1, introducing various improvements to the signing flow. Additionally, the wallet optimizer now sets a limit of 200 inputs for regular wallets per optimization transaction, and 200 inputs and 20 distinct tokens for Ledger wallets per optimization transaction.
NFTs & Tokens
Auction House
Auction House has successfully released V3 of their platform, which is running smoothly. They are actively addressing user feedback to enhance the overall user experience and improve the platform's features.
Lilium
Lilium has been making progress towards its mainnet launch. They added new features like explicit NFT options, improved royalties, and whitelist tokens for artists to allow free mints. The launch has been delayed by a week or two to implement some final changes. The front end for the new features is still being developed and is expected to be launched soon.
ErgBass
ErgBass implemented the halving to ensure that they don't run out of tokens, and the site got completely redesigned. The team is also working on artist collaboration for designing trophies and a partnership with Banker coin and Ergo Champions.
Comet
Comet is actively working on developing a new DApp front-end and off-chain bot template. These efforts aim to expedite future development processes and improve the user experience within the platform.
Digigoats
Digigoats V3 1.0.0 is LIVE!
Other
Sigmanauts
A big shout out to qx() this month for organising and editing a bunch of the ErgoVersary videos! The Sigmanauts also introduced an on-chain voting procedure that generates a unique wallet for each vote, allowing participants to express their choice with a yes, no, or abstain option. This ensures a streamlined and secure voting process within the project. If you like their work - they’re currently running a fundraiser raffle you should consider supporting.
Yoroi Ergo Wallet Recovery Tool
This handy tool was brought to you by the developer behind the satergo wallet. Yoroi's centralized servers for Ergo features have stopped working, they do not provide any support, and it has never made it possible for users to retrieve their seed phrase. If you have your Ergo wallet open in Yoroi and know the password for it, you can use this tool to decrypt the wallet and send all funds to a new wallet of yours.
ErgoPort
ErgoPort has made updates to its price bots and tracking system, adding Bass and GreasySex tokens to the mix. This enhancement allows for improved monitoring and tracking of these tokens.
ErgCube
ErgCube is currently focused on developing a new tokens dashboard. This dashboard includes charts, holders' statistics, metrics, and basic information about the tokens. The team has already created a free token dashboard with several useful features. These features include metrics for hourly, daily, and monthly prices, the ability to check all swaps, Bull and Bear sentiment indicators, a rich list, information about NFTs related to each token including their volume, SigmaFi bonds related to each token, a staking rewards calculator, and a conversion calculator for ERG to dollar for each token. With these efforts, ErgCube aims to provide users with valuable insights and data about various tokens within the Ergo ecosystem.
Media
Video
Ergo - Why it's The Successor of Bitcoin & Something You NEED To Know About!
How to buy Erg (Ergo) in the USA and use it as a lender or borrower! Join qx() as he shows you step-by-step how to move from Coinbase - Kucoin - Spectrum Finance - Sigmafi!
Articles
In an industry with an overwhelming number of projects, it can be a daunting task for developers, project leads, and community members alike to choose a blockchain upon which to build. Proven to be a robust and secure network, the Ergo Platform offers a vast amount of unique tooling for developers who wish to build smart contract-enabled dApps. In this article, we will go in-depth on several reasons why it is beneficial for a new project to build on Ergo.
Discussions
And that’s a wrap!
We’ve reached the character limit for email once again. Thanks for reading! The ecosystem is vast and rapidly growing. If your project has been omitted from this update — apologies! But get in touch at team@ergoplatform.org or tag me (Glasgow) on any of the socials and I’ll get it added!