OmiseGO Shares Development Updates on Scaling Solution Plasma, Heavy Research Also Underway

In a recent reddit post, the OmiseGO team has revealed some updates to their much-anticipated scaling solution, the Plasma Network, as well as clarified their current related research efforts. The updates satiate anticipation for the scaling solution, which OmiseGO will be the first to implement.

For those unaware, the Plasma Network is a proposed scaling solution developed by Joseph Poon and Vitalik Buterin. It is an off-chain solution that, in the simplest terms, creates blockchains within blockchains. It takes the burden of validation off the main chain and, in a vague sense, splits the transaction workload. When a dispute occurs, the child chain takes it to the main chain for resolution.

Current Plasma Developments: Plasma MVP and Watcher

OmiseGO’s reddit post covers 2 important features of the Plasma Network: smart contracts and the Watcher API.

With respect to smart contracts, the team is working on developing a productionized version of Plasma MVP (Minimum Viable Plasma), a very basic version of Plasma that offers a minimum level of security. It is currently undergoing testing for its preparation for a first round of auditing.

The team says that, as auditing nears completion, they will move onto a more sophisticated version of the product.

The Watcher API is a key part of the child chain system, and monitors child chain blocks for transaction validity. Should an invalid transaction arise, it triggers the exit protocol that begins the dispute process.

Currently, Watcher is being tested, logged, and monitored for performance. The idea is to flesh out the features so that it encompasses all possible child chain interactions.

Plasma Research: Mass Exits and BLS Signatures

As for research, the team’s efforts are invested in mass exits, BLS signatures, and Plasma education. They also organized a meetup in New York City last week.

The research efforts were discussed in a Plasma-related call held between team members:

The capacity for mass exits, which would allow exits to happen on a large scale, is a practical necessity, and the team is in the early stages of planning this feature. Although it is viable today, it requires optimization.

Related to this is the development of BLS signatures, which in combinaton with zk-SNARKs is a methodology that the team hopes can greatly optimize mass exits.

BLS signatures are described as follows:

In a nutshell, a threshold signature for a set of private keys can only be created if some predefined percentage of those keys signs off. For example, we could require that 67% of validators have to sign off on a block to make it valid. This is exactly what we need in order to scale to hundreds (or even thousands of validators).

Unfortunately, we don’t have much information on what went on in the meetup, except that Plasma seems to be the major talking point of these meetups. Those living around New York will have the chance to attend these Plasma workshops, as several more will be organized over the next month.

Lastly, team members, along with several contributors, have released documentation on Plasma, called LearnPlasma.

OmiseGO is a premier project in Asia and has the potential to greatly aid a region with a rapidly developing economy. While updates are somewhat sporadic, when they do arrive, they get to the point and are meaningful in their substance. Plasma is expected to arrive soon, though we don’t have a specific timeline.

Until then, you can do your research on OmiseGO, a project that many consider to be worthwhile.

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