Every week brings Swarm City Dev closer to releasing Boardwalk. This past week the update for Terminal was put in the hands of testers, and the response was positive. This version loads much quicker, displays USD, and gives users the ability to restore a backup wallet from a json file. The Devs have deployed the new version as of this morning, so once it propagates the internet, all users will be able to experience the updates.

Also, this testing round brought up some interesting feedback from the testers regarding the user experience. One bit of feedback is that initially there were only two types of users who would interact with swarm.city; those who owned ARC tokens to swap, and those who didn’t. Now a third type exists; those who own SWT tokens. So that means a new type of user needs to be able to negotiate the interface, and thus the interface will need to be updated to accommodate them.

The testers offered other excellent feedback, and @kikipluche is going through all of it to determine what things have been solved, and what things can and will be integrated into future updates.

By now the dev updates should be giving readers some insight into how the Dev Team works. They develop in sprints; coding and designing. When complete, they send the product to the testers for feedback. Once testing confirms the product is functioning as expected, it goes live. Repeat. Last week marked the end of Sprint 2. The Dev Team is now in the 3rd Sprint for the Boardwalk release.

Sprint Three Back End Dev

This week @sponnet is working on writing the hashtag contracts that form the fundamental backbone of Boardwalk. As explained in previous posts, hashtags give context to each transaction, so for instance #needaride could be used for rideshare type transactions. Service seekers and providers, and buyers and sellers use hashtags to communicate, transact, and build reputation.

@Sponnet is coding the actual functionalities that take place in hashtags, like the ability for a user to create a service request (make deal), and approve a service was rendered successfully (payout). Here is a link to the GitHub repository @sponnet is working in.

https://github.com/swarmcity/sc-dappcontracts/blob/master/contracts/SimpleDeal.sol

Keep in mind that this current iteration can be likened to a demo recording. It’s more an artist’s sketch than it is a finished product. @Sponnet will refine it until he believes it to be album quality.

Sprint Three Front End Dev

@Faffy_dee has completed front end development for Boardwalk, so now he will be going back through with an eye towards enhancing the user experience. He will also be spending time working on a more robust version of the website with the Communication Hive.

Connect With The Dev Team

@Bkhawk is optimizing code while at the same time organizing the Swarm City GitHub to make it easier to onboard developers. Even though there are more or less industry standards on how to organize code, to a certain extent each project and project team must learn how to work and write together. @Bkhawk is documenting the logic behind the Swarm City repositories so new devs can easily orient themselves.

The Swarm City Dev Team is always on the lookout for other developers who want to get involved. If you have Polymer or Solidity experience feel free to reach out to #devhive on the Swarm City Slack. You can get a peek at the project by reviewing Github, here, or if you’d like to be involved in testing new releases, please join #testersignup on Slack and read the pinned post for instructions.

More to come next week. Cheers!