Enhancing user experience while maximizing decentralization

Before being a web application, Aragon was born as a desktop app.

The line between a web and a desktop app is blurring and will eventually become invisible. Yet, as of today, web apps are still limited, especially in our ecosystem since users need to run software not supported by browsers. For example an IPFS node with its native and fast implementation.

On a browser, users would have to conform with a slower implementation, if any.

That impacts user experience negatively. User experience is at the center of everything Aragon does, and thus we put all our care into it.

But doesn't decentralization hurt user experience? Our answer is that it doesn't have to be that way.

Today, we are proving that we can improve user experience while maximizing decentralization.

We are introducing the next chapter in Aragon user experience. Welcome again, Aragon Desktop.

Blazing fast app loading

Aragon apps are fully decentralized, including their frontend, which lives on IPFS.

We have embedded a fully fledged IPFS node into Aragon Desktop. Experience app loading like never before. It's an order of magnitude faster. It also intelligently caches the apps that you use the most, to provide even better load times.

This also means that you don't need to use mainnet.aragon.org or any other centralized IPFS gateway.

And if you already have IPFS running or installed, don't worry. Aragon Desktop will use it.

Frame support

Frame is the future of signing providers. It allows you to use your hardware wallets in the most secure way possible.

Frame runs directly on your operating system, so any apps can use it to sign transactions. This includes any web app inside a browser, any desktop app, or even a command line tool!

The future: light nodes and The Graph

Aragon Desktop allows us to improve user experience while driving decentralization forward.

In the future, Aragon Desktop could connect to, or embed, an Ethereum light node. This takes decentralization to the next level, not having to rely on trusted servers.

We are also thinking about embedding The Graph. This would allow Aragon Desktop to skip a lot of the loading delays due to crunching raw blockchain data.

I look forward to the day in which you can run Aragon in a fully decentralized manner, without third party nodes or gateways.

We are not there yet, but today, that day gets a little closer.

Download Aragon Desktop now for macOS, Windows, and Linux.