Blockchain Project Observation: Polkadot Parachains Online Process Release, BitCherry Testnet Phase II Coming Soon
Since 2021, the blockchain field has accelerated into the era of ten thousand chain interconnection, and cross chain star projects such as Polkadot, Cosmos, aelf, BitCherry, etc. have also received extensive attention from the market. Among them, Polkadot, as a heterogeneous Multi Chain blockchain network, has taken cross chain as its main selling point since the birth of the project.
It seems that Polkadot has entered the stage of smooth operation, but according to the analysis of the technical personnel in the industry, there are some problems in the protocol design of Polka. In the Polka architecture, in order to reliably synchronize the state of the parachains to the core chain, every block generated by the whole node of the side chain needs to generate a corresponding validity proof block. All nodes of the core chain verify the validity proof block through the algorithm provided by the side chain developer. If the verification is passed, the side chain block related data is written into the core chain (equivalent to the state of the side chain is synchronized to the core chain). However, as the verifier can only verify one side chain at the same time, as time goes on, the same verifier will switch between different side chains. If Polka has many side chains, it means that there may be only a small number of verifiers in one side chain at the same time. If these verifiers happen to be bad people, they can conspire with the collector of the side chain to cheat on the execution of the side chain and synchronize the false data to the main chain. In this case, the security of the side chain will not be guaranteed.
Even if Polka set up the mechanism of "Bounty Hunter" and "Random Inspection". However, one of the biggest problems of this mechanism is that in order to set aside sufficient reporting time, it takes quite a long time from the side chain block submitting the core chain to the side chain block being linked by the core. In the Ethereum cross chain scheme mentioned in Polkadot's original white paper, it takes half an hour for Ethereum to step into the Polka, and one hour for Polka to step back to Ethereum. This means that it may take more than ten minutes or even an hour for a Polka side chain to send a cross chain message before it can be received and processed by the message receiver. In the cross-link time delay, Polka has some problems that cannot be ignored.
As the best means to realize the asset flow, information exchange and value interconnection between different blockchain platforms, cross chain technology is similar to the high-speed channel between different public chains. It can realize the data transmission between different blockchain networks and greatly reduce the transmission cost. The security, performance, and scalability of data on the chain need to be carefully considered. Recently, BitCherry, a blockchain project in the spotlight, has been rumored that its test network is about to enter the second stage. As a scalable blockchain infrastructure based on IPv8 technology, BitCherry splits the data according to the needs of different practical application scenarios and provides corresponding types of side chains according to different circulation contents. The main chain is only responsible for the consensus and transaction of the main token, while the number of side chains can increase with the increase of business volume and data, and the nodes of different sub chains handle their own business and according to the design of multi-layer systematic security assurance mechanism, to resist all kinds of attacks. However, BitCherry is still in the early stage of technology research and development, and its main network is not online yet. At present, there is no actual case in the market to verify the practical use of its technology concept.
Blockchain technology as an emerging technology, most projects are crossing the river by feeling the stone at present. It is not difficult to choose the development direction, but the difficult thing is to choose the right direction. The current cross chain projects have distinct technical characteristics, and their different characteristics will attract different demanders in the future. What we need to do now is to give more tolerance and confidence to technological innovation projects.