Wei Wang: Solving the Problem of Storage and Computation is the Only Direction of Development for Blockchain | Part II DxChain Follow May 18, 2018 · 5 min read

On May 7, one of China’s most influential Blockchain media Jinse Finance has published an exclusive interview with the co-founder and chief scientist of DxChain Wei Wang, talking about the importance of storage and computation in Blockchain’s development. Please refer down below for Part I of this interview.

Jinse Finance

The Blockchain technology has evolved from its 1.0 era represented by Bitcoin to the 2.0 era represented by Ethereum. During this process, various DAPP applications based on Blockchain technology are catching even more eyes than before. Along with the dawn of Blockchain age, a variety of public chain projects are rising rapidly just like what the Internet programs did back in the old days. However, questions like what innovations exist in the emerging public chains and what problems can be solved are still provoking thoughts among industry practitioners. DxChain public chain is now winning favor from the industry with their innovative technology and brand-new perspectives. Jinse Finance has invited the co-founder of DxChain Wei wang to this exclusive interview.

DxChain co-founder Wei Wang

3，A distributed ledger is essentially a distributed database

Many believe that Blockchain is just one simple distributed ledger. Wei Wang shared his opinion regarding this claim: “at the beginning of Blockchain technology, it is indeed a distributed ledger. However, a distributed ledge is essentially a distributed database, which matters the most in all applications and even the software development infrastructure. Current database technology is able to construct 80% of the IT infrastructure in our daily life. This is also why Oracle is still leading the competition since it is targeted specifically at database and thus able to expand their business vertically to diverse areas.”

A ledger is in fact a database. From Bitcoin to Ethereum, the nature of being a database can never be part from their technology, regardless of how it evolves. However, they are all challenged by having a small database capacity. Blockchain ledger itself was used to assist consensus rather than directly as storage. The consensus algorithms of cryptocurrency are barely satisfactory as well. In Wei Wang’s opinion, consensus algorithm can be divided into two parts: first is to decide who generate the block. PoW (Proof of Work) and PoS (Proof of Stake), for example, both emphasize this part. The second one is regarding verification. In Bitcoin network, for instance, only the verification of whether a transaction is eligible is required. However, verification is not actual computation. Bitcoin’s low throughput, high latency and useless computation have limited its ability to any further development.

Bitcoin

“Things will change after DxChain is brought into the public chain area. DxChain will be able to achieve upgrades in both storage and computation. First of all, we have the storage ability, which is what Bitcoin and Ethereum are short of. Then we will have big data computation, which is not supported by Ethereum as well. In short, distributed ledger or database has been continuously upgraded since the beginning of Bitcoin.”

4，Bubble is not a bad thing; The market is going back to rational.

The fever of Blockchain technology has become an undisputed fact. Facing the various projects that are emerging in today’s world, followers should be thinking more about what kind of project will be able to land successfully rather than paying much attention to the fluctuation of Blockchain asset price. “Above all, a bubble is not a bad thing but rather worth welcoming. The reason why a bubble exists in an industry is that people saw the potentials inside.” Wei Wang speaks up in his interview with Jinse Finance. “Many from inside or outside of this industry is willing to compare the dot-com bubble in 2000 with the one we are experiencing right now. And they even want to list the stories of giants who was born at that time, like Facebook, and eventually walks out of the shadow. “Bubble has certainly led to a large inflow of funding into technology area. We should understand and embrace such bubble rather than remain negative about it.” Wei Wang adds.

Chaos offered lessons to this industry. The whole Blockchain business is marching in a rational direction. From the investor’s point of view, years of investment have taught them well about this industry. They are thus able to see a clearer picture of the rationale behind. “The two avalanches happened in the market after September last year has sounded the alarm for the individual investors and institutions. Market dynamics of this January, especially, have dawned on me that the market is going back to rational.”

Among all these dazzling projects, the ones that are most likely to achieve landing, in Wei Wang’s opinion, are the ones focusing on improving TPS(throughput). “This is similar to the traditional Blockchain. It requires relatively less improvement and is thus more easily to be implemented. However, the current public chain can easily expose its imperfections if added complex business logic. At this point, we have to return to the initial question of why we are doing the public chain. Although this is a heavy work, it is a must to start from the fundaments so as to bring about actual applications for business.”

Even though the public chain is the basis for the constant improvement of the whole Blockchain business ecosystem, not all underlying chains can represent this new generation.

“Those public chains aiming at increasing TPS will never become mainstream. A minor repair on current outcomes will hardly be applied to most of the business scenarios. An actual valuable public chain needs research and development based on data storage and computation. Therefore, the new generation public chain must be able to solve the problem of storage and computation. This is also the only direction where Blockchain technology would go.”

Original Report：https://www.jinse.com/blockchain/191312.html