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backgroundIn March 2021, the Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan was reviewed and approved by the Fourth Session of the Thirteenth National Peoples Congress, and officially announced to the public. Among them, in the chapter of accelerating digital development and building digital China, blockchain, artificial intelligence, big data, cloud computing, etc. are listed as one of the seven key industries of the digital economy in the 14th Five-Year Plan.this is blockchain
It was mentioned again after being included in the 13th Five-Year development plan in 2016
, it can be seen that the importance of the blockchain at the current stage, and the development of the alliance chain in China has attracted much attention, and enterprises in the industry have been financing continuously. It has entered the ranks of unicorn enterprises; at the same time, Yunxiang, another well-known alliance chain enterprise, also completed the B-round financing of over 100 million yuan half a month ago.(Consortium chain: only for members of a specific group and limited third parties, it internally designates multiple pre-selected nodes as bookkeepers, and the shipping block is jointly determined by all pre-selected nodes. Compared with the public chain, the biggest difference is that it has fewer Token and everyone can participate in the mechanism.)
As an important part of the blockchain, the development of the alliance chain has also received a lot of attention on a global scale, Traditional technology giants like IBM have established a blockchain service department long ago, and have gained a lot. Maersk, a shipping giant, has also cooperated with IBM to launch an open and neutral supply chain platform Tradelens based on alliance chains. So far, there have been More than 300 organizations have joined, including more than ten shipping companies, covering data from more than 600 ports and terminals. The cost reduction and efficiency increase brought by it can directly reduce transportation time, communication costs and storage costs. Organizational structure brings great rewards.。
Therefore, we can see that although the alliance chain is quite different from the public chain, it has not affected its development at all, especially with the emergence of enterprise-level applications,
The alliance chain has become the best choice for enterprises to enter the blockchain industry
So Polkadot, which is also in the field of public chain (of course, strictly speaking, Polkadot is a lower-level meta-protocol than the public chain), can it spark with the alliance chain, and even bring 1+ The effect of 1 is greater than 2. We try to explain from the current development of the alliance chain, and combine the unique Substrate framework of Polkadot ecology to explain its magical effect on the alliance chain for readers.
The current common structure of the alliance chain
Before introducing the development of Polkadot and the alliance chain, lets first take a look at the current well-known alliance chain structures or organizations at home and abroad, as well as the ecology behind them, so that we can have a certain understanding of the current development of the alliance chain, and it is also convenient for future generations. This article describes the possible chemical reactions between Polkadot and the alliance chain.
Commonly used alliance chain architecture
As early as 2015, banks, insurance, securities, business associations, group companies, and upstream and downstream companies began to realize that emerging technologies such as blockchain, whose decentralized and non-tamperable characteristics are solving multi-process management and multi-party collaboration It is very helpful for trust issues, but the public chain is completely open and transparent and everyone can participate, which does not meet the needs of the enterprise itself.
Therefore, based on the thinking of the blockchain and the needs of the enterprise itself, with distributed ledgers and distributed consensus as the core, it is mainly oriented to institutions and organizations, and the blockchain that requires permission to join the network - the alliance chain, has entered the stage of history .
At present, the commonly used alliance chains are based on technologies such as Hyperledger, Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA), R3 Blockchain Alliance, Gold Alliance, and Blockchain Service Network BSN. We briefly introduce them below.
1.1. HyperledgerHyperledger is one of the largest projects in the blockchain industry, consisting of a set of open-source tools and multiple sub-projects. The project was initiated by the Linux Foundation in 2015, and its members include 100 members such as Accenture and ABN AMRO and 100 contributors such as IBM and Digital Asset Holdings.Hyperledger aims to
Define and develop industry-standard blockchain technology, enabling developers to use the technology to build standardized applications for multiple industries. Hyperledger wants to help companies build private or consortium permissioned blockchain networks, where multiple organizations can share the authority to control and operate nodes within the network.At present, Hyperledger has
In fields such as finance, insurance and healthcare
With extraordinary achievements, its attempts in the supply chain also provide a good model for the application of blockchain. The blockchain technology adopted by IBM, a world-renowned technology solution provider, is Hyperledger Fabric, one of Hyperledgers sub-projects.1.2. Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA)
The Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA), established in 2017, was led by many large companies such as JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft, and Intel.
From the initial 30 corporate members to nearly 300 Fortune 500 companies, innovative companies, research institutions and technical service companies around the world, it is known as the worlds largest alliance chain.Its original intention is to create a series of standards on best practices, security, privacy, scalability and interoperability based on Ethereum, making it easier for enterprises to use Ethereum blockchain technology, and is committed to developing enterprise-level blockchain technology with Ethereum. Blockchain, which helps enterprises move towards the era of decentralized ledger systems, is a large non-profit organization.
The Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) provides services for various industries such as banking, mobile phones, pharmaceuticals, automobiles, management consulting, and Internet hardware.
Provides an entrepreneurial community of service and innovation.
1.3. R3 Blockchain AllianceThe R3 blockchain alliance is known as the worlds top blockchain alliance. Founded in 2015 by New York-based blockchain startup R3CEV. It is an alliance chain that applied blockchain technology in the financial field earlier and introduced distributed ledger technology to global banks.。
The R3 blockchain alliance aims to access mutually distrustful nodes around the world, and record the transaction information of people or institutions on each node, thus calling it a global financial database. it can
Promote code sharing in the global financial industry and reduce the cost of financial services for everyone
At present, the R3 blockchain alliance has more than 80 international bank members, including China Ping An, China Merchants Bank and other large domestic institutions. And it has been tried and applied in the banking and insurance industries.1.4, Gold Alliance
FISCO BCOS Gold Alliance is an important representative platform of blockchain alliance chain in China, led by WeBank, co-founded by more than 20 financial institutions and technology companies in 2016, dedicated to the research of alliance chain technology.。
Gold Alliance
Committed to the application of blockchain technology, it has created multiple tools and solutions such as cross-chain collaboration, middleware, privacy protection, data governance, and blockchain governance
As an open source platform, the FISCO BCOS Gold Alliance currently brings together more than 40,000 individual developers and more than 2,000 companies and institutions to participate in the joint construction, and has pan-industry attributes. It has become the leading blockchain community organization in China and ensures its activeness. Spend.1.5. Blockchain service network BSNBlockchain Service Network BSN is
The worlds first infrastructure network that is independently innovated by China and controls network access rights, which can be rapidly deployed globally. It was jointly initiated by the State Information Center, China Mobile Communications Corporation, China UnionPay Co., Ltd., and Beijing Jujube Technology Co., Ltd.The blockchain service network BSN aims toChange the current high cost of blockchain application development and deployment。
, to provide developers with a public blockchain resource environment based on the concept of the Internet. Developers can use their familiar programming language to release blockchain applications without any experience in blockchain development.
Greatly reduces the development, deployment, operation and maintenance, intercommunication and supervision costs of blockchain applications
The blockchain service network BSN is composed of public city nodes all over the world, and 128 public city nodes have been established, including 8 international nodes.
Substrate-based consortium chainThrough the above introduction, we can have a basic understanding of the current alliance chain at home and abroad. So can we build an alliance chain that meets the needs of daily applications based on the Substrate framework?。
Fabi, the technical vice president of the Parity Foundation, the core project of the Polkadot project, once pointed out at a meeting in Wuhan, China,
It can be understood that Polkadot provides a good conceptual model with a high degree of interoperability and security.
On October 29, 2020, Polkadot announced to officially join the BSN open alliance chain. After technical adaptation, as one of the underlying frameworks of the BSN open alliance chain, it will provide Chinese enterprises and developers with compliant, low-cost, and easy-to-develop Blockchain application operating environment.
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Polkadot and the spark of the alliance chain
Although the development of the global alliance chain is in full swing, there are still many problems in the alliance chain, such as difficulty in upgrading, low scalability, and monotonous ecology.As we all know, after years of development and iteration of blockchain technology, there are now many mature underlying frameworks that can be used to build alliance chains. Common ones include Hyperledger Fabric, FISCO BCOS, etc.Then compared with these underlying frameworks,
The technical framework behind Polkadot - Substrate framework
What is so unique about it? And how it inspires developers to rush to join them.
Advantages of SubstrateWhen it comes to this topic, we have to revisit the advantages of the Substrate framework. In 2018, Dr. Gavin developed a new blockchain in only 15 minutes through an original Mac computer. In those years, this move brought earthquake-like strong subversion to the blockchain industry.。
And all these feats
lies in the Substrate frameworkTherefore, the Substrate framework has。
Specifically,Modularity, diversification, strong scalability, high degree of freedom, interoperability, strong security, etc.Specifically,The Substrate framework first creates many modules such as database, public/private key generation, data structure, settlement, time stamp, etc.
, which greatly saves the development cycle and development process of the RD team
. As a free and open source framework, Polkadot gives all developers around the world a very simple access mechanism.This is particularly important for enterprises, especially when faced with a new technology, enterprises often need to carefully calculate the time, effort and cost required to use the new technology, as well as the possible return in the end. Therefore, for enterprises, using the Substrate framework to build a blockchain saves time, effort and money, and can be customized, which is very convenient. This can also encourage enterprises to use blockchains to innovate and explore.At the same time byThree-layer structure of Substrate Core, Substrate SRML and Substrate Node。
The Substrate framework allows developers to select the components they need from the modules to set parameters, and at the same time, it can also ensure that developers can switch between convenience and technical freedom at any time.
maintain a high degree of freedom
The fork-free Runtime upgrade of the Substrate framework is also an important solution that is missing in the alliance chain. It solves the problems caused by the traditional fork of the blockchain and improves the security of the blockchain. The existence of Runtime enables the blockchain based on the Substrate framework to truly achieve a one-click upgrade, which provides a basis for repairing important security vulnerabilities, adding new functions, restoring the ecology of the chain, and changing core rules, which is very helpful for enterprises or institutions. The alliance chain is rapidly iteratively upgraded.
In 2020, Substrate FRAME created a node authorization pallet component, allowing developers to easily transform the blockchain built on the Substrate framework into a consortium chain.
The team behind ChainX also removed the Staking module from a Substrate chain, replaced the balance module (responsible for token management) with a point module, and then changed the consensus mechanism of a Substrate chain from babe+granpda to aura+grandpa (because the alliance The chain needs to design the access mechanism of nodes, it does not need the randomness of babe, and the polling consensus of aura is better), so in another way, the consortium chain of the Substrate framework is realized.
Building an alliance chain based on the Substrate framework can take advantage of the advantages of the Substrate framework on the basis of maintaining its strong controllability, fast transaction speed, and data not being disclosed by default.Advantages of Polkadot architecture。
In addition to the Substrate framework, using Polkadot to build a consortium chain itself has many benefits. The combination of Polkadot relay chain and parachain,It enables Polkadot ecology to better carry out cross-chain collaboration, and has higher scalability and better securityThe most distinctive thing about the Polkadot ecology is that as Polkadot combines different blockchains with the same security umbrella——
The relay chain is heterogeneous. Whether it is Bitcoin, Ethereum or Solana, etc., by building a parachain slot, it can become a blockchain in Polkadot, that is, a parachain, which lays the foundation for ecological prosperity.it achievedInteraction between blockchains
, and even value exchange
. Whether it is a public chain or an alliance chain, while maintaining its own verification nodes, it can also allow the characteristics of one chain to be used by the other to achieve complementary advantages. The design of the parallel chain enables each chain to be optimized for a specific use case, creating the possibility for dedicated chains.
We can give a simple example. Polkadot’s relay chain is like a power board, and different blockchains as parachains can be connected to it through the construction of plugs. Therefore, in the future, whether it is a public chain or a consortium chain With the prosperity of the ecology, it will gradually become an unbreakable security network interconnected by thousands of chains.
Cross-chain advantages of Polkadot public chain and alliance chainIn addition to the above two points, compared with the alliance chain, Polkadot also has an advantage that other public chain ecology cannot match, that is Polkadots cross-chain advantage.As an ecosystem with heterogeneous parallel chains, Polkadot directly carried out the cross-chain design based on the Rust programming language at first, which made
Polkadot can process many transactions on multiple chains in parallel, and provides very stable cross-chain communication, which can also bring cross-chain and scalability to the alliance chain connected to Polkadot.。
As Gavin said, there is no chain that can realize all functions. In the future, there must be a chain that specializes in certain functions. Then, when an alliance link enters Polkadot, it can be used from
On Polkadots public chain, you can get all-round support for lending, insurance, wallet, DAO, oracle, etc.
This creates the possibility to realize the communication between the chain providing financial services and the real world data chain (oracle machine chain). At the same time, the Polkadot public chain makes community governance more transparent. Far beyond the alliance chain alone.
Polkadot empowers the current dilemma and breakthrough of the alliance chain
Although we have talked a lot about the advantages of combining Polkadot and the alliance chain, looking back at reality, Polkadot still needs more support in the alliance chain. Despite some embarrassments, the future is still bright.
dilemma
If it is involved in the field of alliance chain technology, then the object of competition will become a traditional technology giant, and the customer will become a traditional enterprise. For traditional enterprises, compared with cutting-edge blockchain technology like Polkadot or Substrate, traditional technology giants like IBM or Ali have already had blockchain practice for many years, and they have already had enough experience in the Internet field. Therefore, traditional companies will think that the technology of traditional technology giants is more secure and more credible.
Polkadot currently has limited influence in the traditional circle, and there are relatively few cases in the alliance chain field. Therefore, for enterprises, the previous advantages cannot be used to persuade them to use this technology. What they value more is the lack of stability. The heritage of competing with traditional technology companies.
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Breaking
Of course, the so-called dilemma is actually waiting to be solved. Facing the current dilemma, Polkadot still has many ideas to solve it. Let’s try to sort out these logics below.However, different companies often use blockchains developed by themselves, and the data information of the two chains cannot interact. Therefore,。
andConsortium chains also form many data islands, which, like public chains, also have cross-chain requirementsand
The goal of Polkadot itself is to link all blockchains
It is worth mentioning that the cross-chain itself is not that difficult. We once discussed in Exploring Polkadot丨Cosmos and Polkadots cross-chain is the same thing? It is enough to understand the cross-chain article This article has introduced various cross-chain technologies in detail.
so,There will still be technologies to connect two chains in the alliance chain field, just as some public chains link Ethereum and BSC, but such a single-point connection is difficult to form a joint force, and what Polkadot does is more Extensive cross-chain is to form a huge blockchain network composed of many blockchains, which will form a network effect. In the future, new chains will always want to connect to Polkadot ecology, because when many public links enter Polkadot After the card, almost all encrypted assets, users, and developers are in the Polkadot ecosystem. This is an incomparable feature of other projects that only interconnect a few chains.so,
Polkadot still occupies a natural and largest ecological niche, and there are basically no competing projects. Then, in the field of alliance chain, Polkadot can occupy an important ecological niche of alliance chain cross-chain with the logic of cross-chain, and provide cross-chain solutions with some well-known alliance chain technologies such as Hyperledger, or FISCO BCOS, so that many Mature alliance chain projects are interconnected; and Polkadots own network effect, or the rare feature of allowing alliance chains to interact with public chains, attracts more alliance chain projects to join the Polkadot ecosystem.From this point of view,Polkadot is also just needed for the alliance chainIn the near future, the alliance chain and the public chain will no longer be as clear as before, such as the Chu River and the Han Dynasty, but like Tai Chi, you have me, and I have you, and they can perform their duties and be interconnected.
By that time, Polkadot, as the infrastructure connecting the Chu River and the Han Realm, will usher in a new wave after all.
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Summary OutlookWe dare not draw conclusions directly on how the blockchain will develop in the future, but we can still come up with some points of view based on the law of the development of things.In the future, it is likely that centralized enterprises and institutions will use alliance chains to build new business cooperation models, All walks of life will have one or more huge alliance chain platforms to empower the development of the industry. Another level,
The development of the public chain is also unstoppable
, emerging decentralized applications, and decentralized collaborative projects that everyone can participate in have unlimited potential.The current alliance chain and the public chain are still in a state of fragmentation, but the two most practical aspects of the current public chain field - DeFi and NFT have also quietly evolved, and are no longer purely a paradise for decentralized assets. It is a product of gradually connecting with physical assets, or empowering the real industry, and becoming a horizontal frame of centralized assets and decentralized assets.Under such a trend,
It will be a matter of time before the alliance chain and the public chain get through
, and Polkadot, which aims to become the underlying infrastructure connecting all blockchains, is undoubtedly the technology most likely to realize this vision.
Perhaps one day in the future, we will no longer be entangled in whether a certain digital asset is based on a consortium chain or a public chain. At that time, blockchain must have become one of the most popular technologies like Internet technology.
Looking at the present, the wave of domestic alliance chains seems to have arrived. At the capital level, many high-quality alliance chain technology companies such as Qulian, Xita Technology, and Heyue Technology have obtained huge financing. At the policy level, just a few days ago on June 7, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Central Cyberspace Administration of China issued guidelines to accelerate the application of blockchain technology and industrial development.The opinion proposes that by 2025, the comprehensive strength of the blockchain industry will reach the worlds advanced level, and the industry will begin to take shape. Cultivate 3-5 backbone enterprises with international competitiveness and a group of innovation-leading enterprises, and create 3-5 blockchain industry development clusters.
With a clear policy indicator, the development of the alliance chain is bound to break through, setting off a new wave of technological reform
