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Comparing NFT Standards - ERC-721 vs ERC-721a vs ERC-1155

Wanna be in the same league as Damien Hirst, DC, and Niftys? Then build your NFT on the Palm network!

Infura and Palm NFT Studio are excited to announce that the Palm network is now available to all users of Infura. Nearly 430,000 developers now have access to create NFTs on the Palm network.

The Palm NFT Studio

The Palm network is an Ethereum sidechain dedicated to selling, purchasing, and trading NFTs that are associated with real-world and digital assets. Palm provides low gas costs and fast transaction finality. The network is over 99% more energy efficient than Proof of Work-based blockchain networks, providing artists with a more sustainable solution today, while Ethereum upgrades to Proof of Stake in the Merge, tentatively scheduled for release in July 2022.

The Palm NFT Studio has collaborated with Damien Hirst, DC, Niftys and Warner Brothers and other artists in minting NFTs on the Palm network.

How to mint an NFT on Palm

For users looking to mint NFT projects, the Palm network provides an effective solution to create NFTs that are able to be bridged back to Ethereum.

To access the Palm mainnet or testnet endpoints, here’s how to get started:

1. Login to your Infura account and select an existing Ethereum project (or create a new Ethereum project if you have not yet).

2. Click on the settings of the project to view the Palm API endpoints.

Using Palm mainet and testnet is free as part of all Infura plans, and requests sent to the API count as part of your existing plan. No action is required to activate Palm, and the availability of Palm testnet allows you to have an environment to begin developing and testing your NFT project before going live.

See our documentation on Palm for more information, as well as links to helpful tutorials.

Get in touch and start building

Interested in creating your own NFTs, but do not know where to start?

Learn more from Infura’s Director of Engineering, Kris Shinn, on minting NFTs using Infura and Replit, based on his EthDenver 2022 presentation.

Let us know how you are using NFTs in our Discord and feel free to ask questions in our community.

Just getting started with Infura? Our docs will get you building.

Ethereum Network Updates, Upgrades, Hard Forks

Infura - Ethereum Network Updates

Network

The Palm network is now available for all NFT creators on Infura

Last July, we published Ethereum JavaScript Libraries: web3.js vs. ethers.js (Part I) to provide “a comparison of web3.js and ethers.js, focusing on their similarities and differences, so that you can better understand the nuances of the libraries.”

To recap, we dove into the documentation of both libraries. We then used a modified version of a software evaluation framework Andres Canal established in his article “Using Quill,js to Build a WYSIWYG Editor for your Website” to guide the reader toward making the best decision in choosing which library to use.

The article was “written with the intent of educating developers to understand the tradeoffs between the two libraries to be able to make a decision of which library to use for their particular use case.”

How have the conclusions from that article changed over the course of the past year?

Table 1: Comparison of Conclusions about Web3.js and Ethers.js




July 2020
October 2021




Web3.js has a community of users and maintainers associated with the Ethereum Foundation. Web3.js has a good API reference and has been around since 2015. Many projects are using it and the library has been the go-to in many "Build Your First dApp" tutorials.
Web3.js is best for those who prefer the most-used Ethereum javascript library that is also maintained by a blockchain-focused firm. Web3.js's strengths are its tests and community. Documentation is currently modest in design and scope and can definitely be improved.


Ethers.js is excellent because it is a small, compact library with a large number of test cases. It has good “Getting Started” documentation, making it accessible to new users. Developers find ethers.js simple and intuitive and the library has gained in popularity over the past two years, seeing increased downloads and usage by projects.
Ethers.js is best for those who prefer lightweight, user-friendly libraries with robust testing and documentation. Ethers.js’s strengths are its documentation, tests and community. It could have more maintainers in order to create some redundancy in the development team - currently a single individual.







Let’s dive into the updated data and explain why these conclusions have changed.


1) How important is the popularity of the library?

To use Andres Canal’s definition,

“A popular project on Github means exactly what you expect it to. Namely, that there are lots of people questioning, contributing, and supporting it. This activity tends to result in more reliable software. You can check the popularity of any project by looking at how many stars it has, how many issues are opened, how many pull requests are pending, and how many contributors worked on the project.”

Web3.js has about 11,600 stars and ethers.js 3,100 as of Oct. 14, 2021. Web3.js is used by 112,849 repositories, compared with 65,519 for ethers.js.

Looking back to July 2020, Web3.js had nearly 8,800 stars while ethers.js had nearly 1,500. Web3.js was used by 51,300 repositories on GitHub, compared with 18,500 for ethers.js.

Web3.js remains the more popular library, but impressively for both libraries, their dependencies have at least doubled over this time period. Web3.js remains more popular, but the overall pie of dependent projects has grown from about 69,800 to 178,368. We will dive more into the dependencies in question 3.


2) How important is the maintenance of the library?

To quote ourselves from the last article,

“We want to use libraries that are updated frequently, so that bugs are squashed and new features are added. Though it is not perfect, looking at a month (or two) of commits, closed issues, active issues, and the number of maintainers over that time period can give a sense of the strengths and weaknesses of an open source project. This also reveals patterns of maintenance, giving some insight to the user of a library when updates and bug fixes are generally addressed, which can be used as a proxy metric for maintenance of the library.”

Using the same metrics from our last article, we see the following for both libraries.

Table 2: GitHub Monthly Pulse for Sept. 14, 2021 to Oct. 14, 2021




Library
Commits to Main Branch
Closed Issues
Active Issues
Maintainers




web3.js
20
60
107
10


ethers.js
2
17
39
1






GitHub Pulse now reveals some additional useful information about the libraries, which gives us even more context of why we are seeing what we are seeing.

For web3.js, we can see that a single individual is responsible for the majority of the commits, though there are three individuals that have 10 or more commits. This is something I see as a plus. This means there is redundancy built into the development team, in case someone were to stop contributing to the project. Web3.js has 121 commits to branches other than the main branch, as web3.js is transitioning off of the 1.x version as outlined in this blogpost the roadmap for web3.js (which we will reference again in the next section). This indicates a lot of work is going into the future releases.

For ethers.js, Richard Moore continues to be the sole maintainer of the library, but there are many more people contributing to the project by opening and closing issues on the GitHub repository, indicating that there is a community of individuals committed to the health of the library. By virtue of a single maintainer, it is not surprising to see fewer overall commits.


3) Who is responsible for the development of the library and how many projects use it?

ChainSafe is the lead maintainer of the web3.js library, having received a grant from the Ethereum Foundation to “continue the maintenance and further development” of web3.js in September 2020. ChainSafe’s outline of the future plans for web3.js reveals major changes coming, such as the deprecation of web3-bzz and web3-shh packages in version 3.x and an eventual move to Typescript in version 4.x. These are exciting additions, but the tradeoff is that ChainSafe will need time to realize these while maintaining the existing library.

Ethers is the lead maintainer of the ethers.js library, which is Richard Moore’s project, so we can think of Richard Moore = Ethers. Ethers has been the lead maintainer of the project since the inception of it. This can be a risk for some projects, but in this case, it has made ethers.js very quick in adding features and capabilities. For example, ethers.js is fully TypeScript-ready with “definition files and full TypeScript source” according to the documentation.


Table 3: Dependent Repository and Package Counts, October 15, 2021




Library
Dependent Repositories
Dependent Packages




web3.js
113,018
4,685


ethers.js
66,950
3,505







Web3.js, likely due to the longer existence of the project, has more repositories and packages that are dependent upon it. When compared with metrics from our last article, ethers.js is closing the gap with web3.js when it comes to dependent packages.


4) How important is it that the library has tests?

Answer: Very important to any dApp developer worth their salt. Luckily for us, both libraries have gotten even better since our last article.

Ethers.js has a test suite API documented for the current v5 release on their GitHub repository. The documentation of the testing is very impressive. Check it out.

Web3.js has added test documentation since our last article. This documentation, based on my personal inspection, appears robust and clearly written.

I believe ethers.js has the lead, but web3.js has done a great job catching up in terms of its tests and their documentation, and I feel both have great coverage when it comes to tests. Tests are a strength for both libraries now.


5) How important is the number of downloads of the library?

As of Oct. 15, 2021, web3.js has 30,767,910 downloads and ethers.js has 24,284,490 downloads. Compare that with May 20, 2020, when we first looked at this statistic, when web3.js had 14,703,432 downloads and ethers.js had 8,500,336 downloads. The overall pie has grown, but the difference in downloads is surprisingly close: a difference in total downloads of 6,484,420 on Oct. 15, 2021 compared with a difference of 6,203,096 in late May of 2020.

When we look at weekly downloads, the two libraries are practically even: web3.js at 330,102 and ethers.js at 339,318. Weekly downloads of both libraries have nearly doubled since we last checked this statistic (May 20, 2020, for those following along): web3.js at 175,661 and ethers.js at 184,798.


6) How important is web performance?

Web performance is indirectly measured by comparing the size of the libraries, as we are assuming smaller libraries take less time to load in the browser.

Both libraries are small. Web3.js has decreased the size of the library to 7.28 MB unpacked (unpacked refers to the size of the library when published) from 10.6 MB when we last checked. Ethers.js touts its very small size, which has increased to 322 kb uncompressed from 284 kb uncompressed over the same time period. It’s unclear what occupies 322 kb within ethers.js. NPM shows ethers.js 10.2 MB unpacked, and I confirmed this when I downloaded to my personal machine and calculated the size of the ethers.js package using the Finder application on Macs. So we have to take ethers.js's word that it is small in size, which is a big plus, though I do need to do further research to confirm this claim is valid.


7) How important is the quality of the documentation?

Ethers.js is the clear winner when it comes to the quality of the documentation of the library and it stands out for three key reasons.

 1. Ethers.js has an extensive “Getting Started Guide,” which helps a user orient themselves to both the library and the vocabulary of Ethereum.
 2. Ethers.js has useful call outs and additional information provided as part of the documentation, giving the end user visual cues, convenient links, and other helpful user experience features that make reading and using the documentation an enjoyable experience.
 3. Ethers.js documentation has an extremely useful feature - a toggle to single page view, in which all documentation is provided on a single page. This makes using “Ctrl + f” in the documentation a breeze, and helps with finding the method you are looking for quickly.

Web3.js has not had many visible changes to the documentation since our last article and could use an update to make the user experience more pleasant.

An indirect additional comment on the documentation - ethers.org provides a very helpful “playground,” where you can try out the library in browser: https://playground.ethers.org/. This useful feature lets a user get started playing around with the library quickly and easily. While it could be argued that remix.ethereum.org provides a similar playground experience for web3.js, this is not the goal of remix, and remix support ethers.js as well.


8) How important is the overall usage of the library?

The last time we looked at the numbers, web3.js was the clear winner in overall usage, with ethers.js gaining users at a rate that appeared that it would only be time before ethers.js caught up to web3.js. The results today show that both have healthy ecosystems and a large number of users. My personal belief is that the overall growth of the ecosystem shows that both libraries have been adopted by a significant number of projects and users. So, while web3.js has more downloads, stars, and overall metrics, ethers.js is competitive to web3.js in its usage. It’s fair to say both have been widely adopted.


9) How important is the license?

This is one area that has not changed since we last reported. Web3.js still has the LGPLv3 license and ethers.js the MIT license. I am not a lawyer, and so this is the hardest area for me to pick a winner. It is worth reviewing Slava Todavchich’s article “Understanding open-source and free software licensing,” which we suggested in our July 2020 blogpost.

But wait... there is a new category!


10) How important is the community and community experience?

Yes, I am adding a new way to evaluate the two libraries, based on my experience in Developer Relations and Software Community. I am personally looking for robust channels where developers using the software can interact with one another, find information about updates and hotfixes, share their use cases and help each other debug their code. The best software projects provide this for their users and it is a differentiating factor.

Web3.js and ethers.js have both embraced Discord as a means to communicate directly with their community of developers. Web3.js lives within the ChainSafe Discord Server, in the channel #web3js-general. Web3.js has used this channel not just to interact with developers, but  as of September 2021, to promote a web3.js developer survey to help drive the direction of changes for version 4.x of web3.js. Ethers.js utilizes the EF JavaScript Team Discord Server, in the #ethers channel. Both are active channels with communication on a daily basis.

Both also use Twitter to communicate changes to their audiences, though both have relatively light follower counts. @web3_js (1,250 followers) and @ethersproject (1,279 followers) only tweet to announce updates and changes to the libraries, serving as another way for notifications about updates to get through to developers.

ChainSafe also uses their Medium account to post some updates about web3.js, though not a regular cadence.  

GitHub continues to be a source of discussion for communities of both libraries, though the shift to Discord by both reflects a growing trend in the Ethereum community, as well as in software communities in general, to commit to this tool for a mix of synchronous and asynchronous communication.

The verdict is that both take development and interaction with their communities seriously.

What’s the next step?

You should go ahead and test out the libraries themselves with Infura, and we created a tutorial for just this purpose: Ethereum JavaScript Libraries: web3.js vs ethers.js (Part II). The best way to see if my evaluation is valid is to kick the tires on both libraries.

In conclusion, instead of declaring a winner, it seems that Ethereum itself is benefitting from having two leading JavaScript front-end libraries. More libraries being built that can utilize the features of web3.js and ethers.js will push them to be even better (like web3-react, for example). In updating this article, I have been struck by the growth of downloads and dependencies of both libraries, making me of the opinion that you can choose either and feel comfortable with the decision. I hope this illuminated some ways you can evaluate both to choose what works best for you.

Get started building on Infura for free today.

Ethereum JavaScript Libraries: Web3.js vs Ethers.js: An Update

As the clock ticks down to the Merge, the Teku and Infura teams have continued refining their collaboration. In case you missed it, these two teams have created an eye-poppingly fast Ethereum 2.0 client sync experience. Since then, they have continued refining their integration and made some important discoveries and improvements.


Attestations with Teku

One of those discoveries was that validators linked to a remote beacon node could have significant performance issues: specifically, a lot of missed attestations. Obviously, this is a pretty crucial issue. It turned out to be not just a problem with a remote beacon node, but specifically a remote beacon node behind load balancers, including Infura’s load balancers.

If you’re interested in the blow-by-blow, check out the Github issue here.

The solution the team came to was to implement an option to disable early attestation publishing when the block is received:

--validators-early-attestations-enabled[=<FALSE>]

Find the full Teku documentation on this issue here.

This option allowed validators connecting to Infura beacon nodes to have performance equivalent to validators connected to a local beacon node, which in and of itself is impressive. It would appear that this is a fix not just for nodes connecting through Infura, but for any context where Teku validators are using load-balanced beacon nodes.

The second innovation the team has made surrounding attestations is batch attestations. This consists of sending all attestations produced for a given slot to the beacon node in a single batch. In the context of Infura, this allows running a lot more validators without hitting rate limits.


The future of history

Another feature that the team has been working on, which isn’t quite ready yet for a full release, is an innovative way to store historical state without having a hard drive the size of the Library of Alexandria.

With increasing adoption of decentralized technology, there is more and more demand, and even novel use cases, for historical chain data. The most top-of-mind for many in the space is tax compliance. Institutions and even individuals are increasingly in need of solutions for being able to query, quickly and cheaply, historical chain data.

Like most great things in this space, the solution being developed uses Merkle tries. Without getting too deep into the woods (pun intended), as it’s not finished yet, the technique essentially takes the difference between slots and stores the branch updates. The applicability for this is tremendous, so watch this space for more updates.


Safety through Diversity

As we approach the reality of Ethereum 2.0, more and more voices are calling out a topic of vital importance: client diversity. The Ethereum Proof of Work consensus mechanism is, at this point, venerable and battle-tested, at least in blockchain terms, and is resistant to 51% of attacks. As the network transitions to Proof of Stake, the threat remains that a single Ethereum client will be running on a majority of validator nodes. This opens the door not only for a malicious attack, but also for single points of failure bringing down the entire network.

For more explanation, check out this very readable primer that should bring a lot of issues into focus. There are so many reasons to make the move to a Proof-of-Stake consensus model, and the network is on track to do so. It would be a stunning failure of vision and quite simply, wildly unsafe to move Ethereum to a PoS network that has a majority of any Ethereum client.

Even if we were to assume that all clients were going to act in the best interests of the network as a whole, which in and of itself is a leap most aren’t willing to take, the Ethereum network is a sprawling global entity with external dependencies. No client should be able to be a single point of failure for the entire network.

As we build the Beacon Chain and validators up and out, client diversity must be included as an essential consideration.

Learn more about Infura’s Eth2 API here and sign up for a free account.

Teku + Infura to 2.0: How to Handle Attestations

SoK: Validating Bridges as a Scaling Solution for Blockchains

So, why would you need a hybrid infrastructure model alongside Infura?

Let’s think about how your database is set up. You probably have your own database, which is great. What happens if that database goes down? Would your app continue to run seamlessly, delivering the experience you want your customers to get? Or, would your database shutdown cause outages and crashes in your app?

If the dataset you’re hosting is a public dataset, you have a new paradigm for making your infrastructure much more resilient and reliable by integrating Infura into your overall strategy. Infura implements a reverse proxy pattern internally and can be a highly reliable and performant node in your infrastructure stack, allowing you the ability to have a portion (or all) of your traffic routed to Infura.

You can choose to keep your database as your primary database with Infura as a backup, or vice versa. In this way, Infura will act as an always-on backup for your database, providing a level of flexibility previously not available with a single database running.

You also have the opportunity to use Infura as a stats comparison tool to make sure your performance is up to par. Alternatively, you may need to handle more load (request traffic) than your infrastructure can currently handle. You can route the overflow to an Infura project ID to handle spikes in traffic so your service stays up and running.

There are many opportunities for you to use Infura alongside your own in-house node infrastructure to improve your user experience. Let’s dive a little deeper on how we accomplish this.


What does it mean when Infura implements a reverse proxy pattern?

Let’s review what a normal proxy is first, and then we’ll flip it and reverse it, a la Missy Elliott, to talk about the reverse proxy. A proxy server (or web proxy or forward proxy) is a server located in front of a group of client machines (computers). When those computers make requests, the proxy server intercepts those requests and communicates with the target web servers on behalf of those clients. Basically, a proxy is a fancy word for a request/response middleman.

If you’re a visual learner, here’s a diagram from Cloudflare that shows just where that forward proxy sits:


What is a reverse proxy?

A reverse proxy is a server that typically sits on the edge of your infrastructure. It is responsible for receiving requests from web clients and subsequently routing them to one or more backend web servers.

Here’s another great diagram from Cloudflare to show how the reverse proxy fits in to the whole flow:




One of the main reasons to use a reverse proxy server is load balancing, ensuring the flow of traffic between clients and servers remains smooth. This is one of the main advantages of using both your own node and Infura. In addition, it allows you to cache content and provides web acceleration for improved performance. Lastly, reverse proxies allow for more efficient, secure SSL encryption and protection from DDoS attacks and related security issues.

As we previously mentioned, Infura can be used as a reverse proxy to assist with ensuring the flow of traffic for your clients and servers stays as smooth as possible, making for a more enjoyable user experience.


Some examples of a reverse proxy in action

Let’s first look at how we can set up a very simple reverse proxy using Caddy.

We will use our localhost and a backend HTTP service running on 127.0.0.1:9000 to make sure we’re getting our reverse proxy working correctly.

First, download Caddy. Once that’s downloaded, check out their Getting Started guide here. Or, follow along to learn how to set up a simple reverse proxy!


At this point, you may be running your own node, but since it takes too long to sync one for this article, we can substitute with a simple NodeJS stub to check that our reverse proxy is working correctly. I simply named mine main.js.


const http = require('http');

const hostname = '127.0.0.1';
const port = 9000;

const server = http.createServer((req, res) => {
   res.statusCode = 200;
   res.setHeader('Content-Type', 'text/plain');
   res.end('Reverse proxy success!\n');
});

server.listen(port, hostname, () => {
   console.log(`Server running at http://${hostname}:${port}/`);
});



This sets up a backend HTTP service running on 127.0.0.1:9000 mentioned earlier and will display a “Reverse proxy success!” message if our proxy is working correctly. To start this, run `node main.js` in a different terminal window and leave that connection open!

Next, we will want to create a Caddyfile (literally create a new text file in whatever directory you’re working in and name it Caddyfile). Once you have that set up, we will set up our simple reverse proxy itself inside the Caddyfile with just two lines:

localhost 

reverse_proxy 127.0.0.1:9000



In this instance, reverse_proxy is where we want to get our information from (the original site), and localhost is where we are redirecting to using our reverse proxy.

Now, from the same directory as your Caddyfile in a new terminal window from your `node main.js`, run:  

caddy run



This will start the caddy server and will allow your reverse proxy to work! Now, you’ll notice when you run this that you don’t see the “Reverse proxy success!” message popping up.

That’s because this just started the server. You now need to make a request to “https://localhost” and you’ll see the message. To do this, open another terminal window (that makes three now, for those of us keeping track), and simply run:

curl https://localhost



Running this command will give you the “Reverse proxy success!” message we were looking for, and now you know you’ve successfully set up a simple reverse proxy.


Enter Infura!

Now that we’ve gotten a basic reverse proxy up and running, let’s try one using an Infura endpoint. We will keep our overall setup of using a Caddyfile the same, but we won’t need the backend HTTP service running in the background, as that will be switched to an Infura endpoint.

We’re going to change up how our Caddyfile looks:

localhost 

reverse_proxy https://rinkeby.infura.io {
   header_up Host {/v3/<YOUR_PROJECT_ID>}
}



You will notice that we’ve added in a “header_up Host” inside the reverse_proxy section. This allows us to include our Project ID to both the Rinkeby endpoint and the localhost endpoint we are proxying to.

To test this out, we will need to send a request, so I used web3_clientVersion as an example:

curl https://localhost/v3/<YOUR_PROJECT_ID> \
-X POST \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"web3_clientVersion","params": [],"id":1}'



When we run this, we get the following output:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"result":"Geth/v1.10.8-omnibus-aef5bfb3/linux-amd64/go1.16.7"}



Cool! But how do I know my reverse proxy is working? Well, if you switch out `localhost` in our curl command to `rinkeby.infura.io`, you get the same output, which shows that our reverse proxy is running properly.


How do you use Infura as a backup for your own node?

We’re going to set things up initially the same as we did in the previous example but with two upstreams, one to our localhost and the other to the Infura node.

Next, we’re going to set up load balancing. Now, what’s load balancing? Load balancing acts like a traffic cop sitting in front of your application servers, routing client requests across all the servers that can fulfill those requests quickly and efficiently.

So how do we set that up?

Since we’re using Caddy, we can refer to their docs for the basics of how to use more than one upstream. When we look at lb_policy, there are many ways to determine which upstream Caddy will use first. Caddy will default to using the first listed upstream and will move down the list if the servers stop responding. In our example, we want to have localhost:9000 from our main.js file be the first upstream, meaning we want our reverse proxy to send the data through our localhost first, so we will identify that by putting it first in our list of upstreams (we will leave our Infura Rinkeby endpoint in as the second upstream):

localhost

reverse_proxy localhost:9000 https://rinkeby.infura.io {
   header_up Host {/v3/66172ed429624788ac264604755ba42c}
}



Since we are using the localhost:9000 port, we want to get that server back up and running. In another terminal window, start the Node server with node main.js.

To make sure everything is set up correctly, let’s run our request through by running the same request from earlier but with the :9000 port included, expecting to get the “Reverse proxy success!” message:

curl http://localhost:3000/v3/<YOUR_PROJECT_ID> \
-X POST \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"web3_clientVersion","params": [],"id":1}'



and we get the following output:

Reverse proxy success!



Excellent! Now, how do we incorporate the Infura endpoint to be a fallback?

You’ll notice we left the Infura endpoint in our Caddyfile where it originally stood and we asked our proxy to load balance using the first upstream (our localhost), which was how we got that “Reverse proxy success!” message.

Now that we confirmed that we set everything up correctly on our end, we’re going to kill the localhost server, mimicking what would happen if your private node went down. Once we do that, our requests should automatically start routing to the Infura node and we should get something similar to the below output:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"result":"Geth/v1.10.8-omnibus-aef5bfb3/linux-amd64/go1.16.7"}* Closing connection 0



But wait! We don’t get that! Instead, we get an error message.

This is because Caddy only allows us to use either two HTTP or two HTTPS endpoints - in our case, localhost is HTTP and our Infura endpoint is HTTPS.

Luckily, there is a tool we can use to make this work with localhost that will create a TLS certificate and sign it with a CA trusted locally by your device and browser. That tool is called mkcert, and it’s incredibly easy to install by following these steps.

Keep in mind if you’re doing this with your own private HTTPS node, you likely will not need this additional step.

If you are following our tutorial step-by-step (using localhost), be sure to follow all the steps, including updating your main.js file to the below to include the HTTPS requirement and the options constant.

const https = require('https');
const fs = require('fs')
const options = {
   key: fs.readFileSync('<PATH_TO_CERTIFICATE-KEY_FILE>.pem'),
   cert: fs.readFileSync('<PATH_TO_CERTIFICATE_FILE>.pem')
};

const hostname = '127.0.0.1';
const port = 9000;

const server = https.createServer(options, function(req, res) {
   res.statusCode = 200;
   res.setHeader('Content-Type', 'text/plain');
   setTimeout(() => {res.end('Reverse proxy success!\n');}, 1000)
});

server.listen(port, hostname, () => {
   console.log(`Server running at https://${hostname}:${port}/`);
});



When you run the mkcert localhost command from the tutorial, the certificate key file and certificate file used in the code above will be created.

Now that we have our localhost running with HTTPS, we can continue! Since we are running everything with HTTPS, we need to update our Caddyfile to reflect those changes.

localhost:3000 

reverse_proxy https://localhost:9000 https://rinkeby.infura.io {
   header_up Host {/v3/66172ed429624788ac264604755ba42c}
}



Now that we have all our files in order, let’s make sure our Node.js server is running and send that request again.

curl http://localhost:3000/v3/<YOUR_PROJECT_ID> \
-X POST \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"web3_clientVersion","params": [],"id":1}'



What do we get?

Reverse proxy success!



Perfect! That’s exactly what we want to get, as we have asked our reverse proxy to go to https://localhost:9000 first.

Now, what happens if we kill the Node server and send our request again? Remember last time we did this, we got an error message. This time we should be getting the result from our Infura Rinkeby node:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"result":"Geth/v1.10.8-omnibus-aef5bfb3/linux-amd64/go1.16.7"}



Success!

Our reverse proxy is, in essence, ignoring the localhost node, as it’s not functioning, and is defaulting to the Infura Rinkeby node!

Super easy, right? Now you know how to use Infura as a backup node to keep your services up and running smoothly!


Where can I learn more about reverse proxies?

Take a look at our client story from MakerDAO. They currently use Infura for a multitude of reasons, including using us as a backup node solution to ensure all developers can use the MakerDAO toolkit!

Another great example is the Polygon PoS network. We initially began working with Polygon to share some traffic load for their network, allowing users to access the Polygon networks via Infura endpoints and effectively ensuring their network remains fast and functional, regardless of traffic spikes they may see. We have since increased our partnership so we are now handling 100% of their network traffic.

Check out this blog post highlighting multiple companies across all verticals using a hybrid infrastructure model of their own nodes plus Infura. Get some ideas on how we can help you accomplish your needs, from verifying transactions to providing backup database services!

If you would like to run an Infura node in addition to your own, sign up for a free trial today.

How to Run Your Own Node AND an Infura Node

When enterprise developers build dapps on Ethereum, they often have to consider the entire tech stack and development process. The list of considerations range from application features such as Web2 interfaces to deployment, which is usually on a permissioned network hosted by a preferred cloud provider. Since most full-stack software engineers build off of SDKs and API calls, it’s important to establish the value of the application with consideration of the deployment network.



Get the best of both Web2 and Web3 worlds

Many enterprise blockchain business cases build on the principles of traditional Web2 development. Web2 focuses on operating with a fluid user experience with attention to detail on scalable and responsive code on multiple devices. A valuable decentralized application (dapp) in Web3 redesigns the economics and industry roles while building on complementary existing systems -- instead of fully replacing those systems with analogous Web3 features.

Say you would like to reinvent a syndicated loans issuance platform such as IPREO. This effort would require significant IT resources to spin up a minimum viable product from the ground up if you’re recreating features like tranche issuance calculations or calendar date exceptions. Instead, consider a path to lesser resistance: blockchain modules that connect these digital assets to new liquidity networks. The functionality is a re-issuance of an existing financial instrument to ABC network with a listing on XYZ automatic market maker rather than the full end-to-end dashboard.

To connect to pockets of liquidity, an enterprise developer must deploy with the same smart contract language that is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and look to bridge the assets to networks with the desired investor and issuer markets.


Why build on public Ethereum?

Until now, publishing enterprise dapps on Ethereum requires significant system integration, executive buy-in and high set-up costs. Recently, we have seen more public blockchains working with enterprises to cover non-functional technical needs in order to meet minimum requirements of security audits and performance. However, the relatively tribal nature of the blockchain developer subculture means that mainstream enterprises are still conservative when it comes to building on Ethereum.

If you are an enterprise developer, consider the following advantages of building on public Ethereum vs. permissioned networks:

1. Faster setup and lower total cost of ownership

2. Immutability and longevity of the data stored with thousands of independent nodes

3. Composability and low barrier of entry to decentralized finance (DeFi)




1. Faster set-up and lower total cost of ownership

This is a standard private blockchain journey for a consortium:

After you develop your dapp, a lot of time is focused on node deployment adhering to enterprise software standards. On the business side, you are also trying to build a consortium to agree on the benefits and adoption before the tech is tested.

The consortium model usually chooses a separate tech vendor that does not have single ownership from one consortium member to prevent conflicts of interest. The tech vendor determining deployment and long-term support likely runs the Ethereum nodes on behalf of participants. This will get the product to market faster and focus on the business benefits.

The last step involves time and licenses for adding more nodes and mutualizing infrastructure costs across participants. Compared with private networks that remove tokens from their operation, public networks require ownership of native tokens to fund transactions. This gas cost pays for the infrastructure -- third parties running full nodes and running operations for mining/validating. In my time building enterprise projects, we have never seen this happen.

The public journey is much more straightforward. After you develop your dapp, the deployment is a choice between public networks with updated configurations on your Truffle setup. The added complexity is the gas costs for funding and running your transactions on this network.

To simplify connectivity to EVM-compatible networks, you can use Infura’s Ethereum API to connect your app instantly with a single line of code. Simplify your transaction management with Infura Transactions (ITX) using prepaid accounts without holding ETH on your balance sheets. ITX is a transaction relayer that manages your transactions to prevent dropped or stuck transactions.

You will also likely want to work with a team such as Diligence that can audit your contracts and monitor them when they’re live.

Public Ethereum has an overall lower total cost of ownership when you compare the operational cost of running a system on mainnet rather than focusing on the ownership and maintenance of the network itself.

A consortium may have more control in the private chain and face less security and treasury reviews at first. However, your infrastructure overhead and negotiations on consortium network matters tend to outweigh the convenience and added features of connecting to mainnet.


2. Immutability and Longevity

The Ethereum mainnet is secured by the interaction of thousands of independent nodes run by individuals and miners throughout the world. Private chains typically have a small number of nodes controlled by one or a few organizations. Those nodes can be tightly controlled, but only a few need to be compromised in order to rewrite the chain or commit fraudulent transactions.

At ConsenSys, we’ve recommended public networks to enterprise developers for their resilience of replicated data as you are able to recover more quickly with a larger network of more than 15,000 independent nodes. The more peers you have, the easier it is to find a seed and fully recover your recorded transactions. In consensus decisions, the more blockchain validators there are to verify transactions, the more difficult it is to coordinate a majority decision that may lead to an attack.

In a permissioned network, the security is governed by the node with the least security. Your network is only as secure as the weakest link. Any added nodes to the network may also increase the surface area of attack. Most institutions will recommend a base software security test in order to join as a full node owner. The node owner will have to pass standard penetration testing to prevent any hacking on the node in case it is a bad actor to the entire network.


3. Composability and Low Barrier to Entry on DeFi


The Ethereum network powers a vibrant ecosystem of third party applications and technology including DeFi and NFTs. A highly composable and interoperable system allows you to connect to DeFi to build financial products that enable and combine multiple apps to match specific user needs. The Ethereum mainnet offers enterprise developers the ability to gain access to market liquidity and provide innovative ways for users to participate in the exchange, trading or growth of that liquidity.

When we say composable, it’s much more than just an open banking API. It’s a set of open source live protocol contracts that can be called and extended. We’ve seen pure forks of open source code like with Uniswap to get sushiswap. The market has seen countless copies of DeFi models such as Compound and Aave, and it doesn’t look like things are slowing down anytime soon.

There’s more and more real value happening in DeFi leading us to believe that cryptocurrencies are not a fad. It is here to stay.

Watch Clemens’ presentation “Pitching Public Ethereum to Enterprises” at EdCon 2021.

Interested in building on Ethereum? Contact us to get support on starting your enterprise project.

3 things enterprise developers should consider when deploying on Ethereum

Are you excited by blockchain but don’t have a great deal of experience coding? It can be easy to fall down a rabbit hole of technical tutorials that make assumptions regarding your initial development knowledge. A particularly important topic to grasp is basic security within your code.

As you begin to build out your very own dApp, you will have to include information such as an Infura API key, along with a mnemonic.

If you are new to coding, this is the equivalent of giving a stranger your social security number and keys to your home. Once this information is public, there is no definitive way to ensure it hasn’t been captured by a person or web crawler, which could result in malicious behavior.

So, how can we address this?

Thankfully, we can use dotenv along with git to protect our sensitive information within our project when / if we push to github.

Dotenv is a zero-dependency module that loads environment variables from a .env file into process.env, storing configuration in the environment separate from the code. It is often a convention for environment variables to be stored in a .env file or other mechanisms based on the server you are using.

Note: This article will focus on building out a project using Truffle and Infura.

In our project, we will need to run the following command:

npm i dotenv


Once the process in our terminal has been completed, we will want to make sure we have the dependency successfully installed. Head over to your package.json file and check to ensure that dotenv has been added under dependencies.

Next, at the root of our project, let’s create a .env file:

Here is where you will add all of the sensitive information that should not be shared.

We will make sure we can access our .env information in our truffle.config file. At the top of the truffle.config file, add the following:

require("dotenv").config


This will tell your project to load anything that is in the .env into an environment variable, granting you access to it.

Now, instead of having to put our Infura api key or mnemonic in an exposed file, we can import that information from our .env file.

When it comes to gaining access to our project key we are going to use, sign up to Infura and create a project. In your dashboard, you should see something similar to this:

The following code is an example between the usage of .env and exposed information within truffle.config:

const HDWalletProvider = require('@truffle/hdwallet-provider');

const infuraURL = 'https://rinkeby.infura.io/v3/<project id here>'

const mnemonic = "Your mnemonic here"


rinkeby: {

provider: () => new HDWalletProvider (mnemonic, infuraURL),

network_id: 4,

gas: 5500000,

confirmations: 2,

timeoutBlocks: 200,

skipDryRun: true

},


Imagine if you pushed this up to github. Anyone would have the ability to open your truffle.config file could take advantage of your exposed mnemonic and project id from Infura.

Let’s take a look at that same code and implement better security practices.

Notice how we are calling upon the information without having to directly add to our file.

One important detail, as of now even with an .env file: if you push this project to github, it will show the .env file, which would defeat the purpose!

Take a look for yourself.

This is where .gitignore comes into play. We will need to create a .gitignore file, so we can push this project up to github.

Without getting into git, a quick summary could be git is version control software that keeps track of all of your files and the versions of them. What .gitignore does is it tells git not to keep track of this file along with everything it contains.

If you want to dive deeper into git along with other foundational material, have a look at our Basic Training, a free course that helps ensure you have the fundamental tools when developing.

At our root (similar to the level our .env file lives), we will create a .gitignore. Inside of that file, we will add .env along with any other files you would rather not be pushed to github.

We can now push our project up to github and notice that our .env file is no longer exposed. Our sensitive information is now much more secure.

If you are experimenting with this, make sure you add your .env file to your .gitignore before pushing.

If you are running into issues, remember gitignore ignores only untracked files. If your files were committed in the past, they are now tracked by git. To ignore them, you first need to delete said files, git rm them, commit and then ignore.

Otherwise, you can delete the .env file and run

Git rm .env --cached


Here is a helpful link discussing the removal of sensitive data from a repo if it was previously committed and discusses how to clean the git history. Savvy attackers don't just look at the most recent repository info, they'll look at the history of it as well.

Note: If you come across it in documentation, a question you might have is
“What is env. example”

An env. example file, on the contrary to this tutorial, is actually included in the repository, it is used as an example file for you to know what KEY=VALUE pairs you need for your project. Most often, it is used to copy the .env file and then change the values.

Example of execution:
Enter to the project root directory using your terminal.

Check if .env the file exists or not.

If the file does not exist then create a file named .env.

Now execute the command

cp .env.local .env.


So the .env.sample file has all the ENV declarations defined but without their values. It helps other developers establish/set up the project without having to reverse-engineer the codebase.

So after git clone, you usually execute the command `cp .env.sample .env` and fill in the values with the Infura credentials as we saw in the example above.

Note: When you create a new repo using github, if you scroll down you should see the option to include a .gitignore file so you don’t have to create one yourself in the future.

Hopefully, you found this article on basic security practices helpful as you begin to develop your very own projects. Feel free to join our Discord if you want to continue the conversation, share projects, ideas, and join the community!

Start here with a free Infura account >

How to Use .env to Enhance Basic Security Within Your DApp

Optimistic Ethereum is a rollup scaling solution that allows users to submit transactions on the Ethereum network and get them executed faster for a much lower gas cost. From the perspectives of users and developers, this is a "parallel universe" called Layer 2, or L2, where users typically have the same addresses as they do on the Ethereum blockchain (also called Layer 1 or L1). There are gateways that allow messages and assets to be transferred between the universes.

The Optimism network API largely uses the same JSON-RPC specification as Ethereum and Infura supports all the necessary API methods for building a fully functional application on the Optimistic Ethereum network.


Why are transactions cheaper on Optimism?

On L1 Ethereum, thousands of nodes run your transaction to verify that the proposed block that includes it is valid. This process is expensive and has to be paid for. Unlike on L1 Ethereum, Optimistic roll ups provide faster and cheaper transactions because it allows users to perform most of their tasks off-chain in a "layer 2" protocol. On Optimistic Ethereum, the smart contract has only two tasks: deposits/withdrawals and verifying proofs of transactions on chain. This makes the process more efficient and a lot cheaper.


Why is this safe?

The great thing about decentralization is you can trust that transactions are executed correctly because there are thousands of computers executing them. Honest miners would reject such a transaction. With rollups, you don't have that level of redundancy.

The answer, in the case of optimistic rollups, is incentives. Every node in the network has to put up a stake before it can propose a new block with the execution results of a transaction. Every other node can check up on those results, and if it thinks they are incorrect, dispute them. The dispute is resolved on L1, so it is as trustworthy as anything else in Ethereum. Whichever node lies, either proposer or disputer, loses its stake and most of it goes to the other node involved.

Of course, the whole point is to avoid running transactions in L1. This system achieves that by making it pointless to cheat. Any proposer who attempts to cheat is going to be caught by the other nodes, lose its stake, and not get the invalid transaction result accepted as valid. A disputer can force a single transaction to go into L1 arbitration as a denial of service attack, but the stake is high enough that it wouldn't be worth doing.


How does Infura work with Optimism?

Infura exposes endpoints for Optimistic Ethereum (the production network) and Optimistic Kovan (the test network). You use them the same way you use any other network, by selecting them from the menu and using the specified endpoint.

There are a few small differences between building on Layer 1 Ethereum and Optimism:

1. You must use the JSON-RPC API as we do not support Websockets yet.
2. Search filters are not yet supported


How to Get Started on Optimism...



The main difference between Optimism and regular L1 Ethereum (other than the cost) is the access point URL.

| Network          | RPC URL |


… If you are using the Truffle development environment

Infura users can add the free Truffle Optimism add-on directly on their Infura dashboard. The Truffle Optimism box also contains the configuration definitions required to use Infura. Currently, you will need to manually add the gas costs of transactions when you use Truffle to run deployments or tests on Optimistic Kovan or the main Optimistic Ethereum network.


… If you are using Hardhat

To use Optimistic Ethereum or Kovan, edit hardhat.config.js's modules.export.networks to add these definitions:

"optimistic-kovan": {
    url: 'https://optimism-kovan.infura.io/v3/<Infura Project ID>',
    accounts: { mnemonic: <your account mnemonic goes here> },
    gasPrice: 15000000,
    ovm: true // This sets the network as using the ovm and ensure
                      // contract will be compiled against that.
},
"optimistic-ethereum": {
  url: 'https://optimism-mainnet.infura.io/v3/<Infura Project ID>',
  accounts: { mnemonic: <your account mnemonic goes here> },
  gasPrice: 15000000,
  ovm: true // This sets the network as using the ovm and ensure
                    // contract will be compiled against that.
}



Then you simply run:

npx hardhat --network optimistic-<kovan or ethereum> <command>



… If you are using Remix

When you use the Remix Optimism plugin to develop for Optimism, network connections are created through the wallet. If you use MetaMask, you can select the network Custom RPC and fill in the details:

What is Optimistic Ethereum?

Non-fungible tokens have been the talk of the town this past month. From the sale of Beeple’s “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” for $69.3MM to NBA Top Shot surpassing $500MM in sales, to EulerBeats already generating over $2MM in royalties, interest in NFTs continues to rise. While it may be too early to say whether NFTs will radically disrupt the world of media, this movement is undeniably forcing us to reconsider deeply held notions of value. Provable scarcity, verified authenticity, and decentralized ownership rights open up a world of possibilities for a new virtual economy and we’ve only just begun to scratch the surface.


Can NFTs Crack Royalties And Give More Value To Artists?

NFTs are changing the way we understand ownership on the internet. The ERC-721 standard that led to the booming market of NFTs is now being revised to allow for a more dynamic standard for paying out royalties, no matter the platform that mints the NFT. EulerBeats, a project from Treum, represents a new way of storing a verifiably unique piece of audio on Ethereum, where future sales are automatically paid out to the original owner, already facilitating over $2 million worth of royalties.


How Barter Built a Direct NFT Trading Interface for Real-time Negotiation

Barter, a project built by ConsenSys Academy student Robert Clark, is specifically engineered for a future where video game assets are tradeable and where the Metaverse begins to emerge as a social phenomenon. With Barter, a direct trading interface between two people allows for real-time negotiation as well as new item discovery. We walk you through how this developer built Barter from the ground up, using Infura and Truffle.


The Financialization of NFTs

Many projects are looking to bring liquidity to NFTs, allowing the holders to earn yield. We examine three of the leading projects looking to financialize NFTs: NFTX, Charged Particles, and Aavegotchi. NFTX allows users to create funds of NFTs that they can then trade on decentralized exchanges like Uniswap, while Charged Particles allows users to add interest bearing tokens to their NFTs. Finally, Aavegotchi introduces some interesting game theory to interest bearing NFTs so that the user must decide between the interest and the NFT itself.


Introducing Palm NFT Studio

This past week, ConsenSys, HENI Group, and Heyday Films launched Palm, a new token-powered ecosystem for NFTs, which is connected to Ethereum, and features low gas costs, fast transaction finality, and 99% more energy efficiency than PoW systems. We are very excited to help power the Palm project alongside notable partners like Uniswap, $MEME, Nifty’s, Protocol Labs, and MetaMask, and the legendary artist Damien Hirst. More details coming soon 👀


Claim Infura Bounties at the Chainlink Spring 2021 Hackathon Happening Now!

Chainlink Hackathon 2021 is in full swing, and we are thrilled to sponsor this years event. The hackathon runs from March 15 - April 11, so you still have time to jump in and hack on some bounties from Infura and Codefi! Our very own EG from Infura will be judging the bounties as well. So jump in and let’s build!

Infura Bounty: We have recently released Infura Transaction Service (ITX). It is a high-throughput relayer that is optimized to reliably send transactions to the Ethereum mainnet in a timely manner while ensuring all transactions do not needlessly overpay the network fee. It is a simple API that is easy to plug-and-play for most projects. Our bounty focuses on integrating ITX with the Chainlink Oracle system (node). The final solution should allow node operators to activate ITX via a config file (or an additional parameter) at the command line. Once it is turned on, all transactions for the oracle will be sent via the ITX service. We hope this integration will help Chainlink fall from the Top 25 Leaderboard for services that pay the most Ethereum network fees and thus reduce the cost of being a Chainlink operator. $1,500 goes to the Infura Project Winner!


Customer Spotlight: ParaSwap

The DEX aggregator ParaSwap used to rely on their own in-house infrastructure, which quickly proved to be very challenging to maintain and scale. Learn why ParaSwap chose to scale their infrastructure with Infura.


Introducing Ethereum Request Packs

Unlock greater request volumes and right-size your account for your daily usage with Ethereum Request Packs: 1,000,000 additional daily requests for only $200 per month!


Deprecation Notice

With the launch of our Eth2 API public beta, we will be deprecating the sharing of project IDs between the Eth1 and Eth2 APIs on April 1, 2021. Here’s what you need to do.


Signal Podcast: Episode 1 with Joe Lubin

Why are financial systems broken? What was it like to launch Ethereum? What is the relationship between collectivism and open-source? How can the banking world mesh with the next generation of financial infrastructure? Check out the first episode of SIGNAL, where Lex Sokolin sits down for an interview with Ethereum Co-founder and ConsenSys CEO, Joe Lubin, to learn about the beginnings of the crypto ecosystem, his experience with AI at Princeton, what he learned at Goldman Sachs, and how all these adventures shaped his vision today. The episode is available on Spotify, Apple, and RSS.


New Developer Resources

 * 100+ Ethereum Apps You Can Use Right Now. As crypto mixes with culture, dapp offerings continue to diversify and mature. Many visionary projects dissolved into the ether during the long, cold bear market, yet we can feel their traces in brilliant apps we love and use today.
 * How To Safely Migrate Your Ethereum 2.0 Validator Client. Coogan’s last installment of “My Journey to Becoming a Validator on Eth2,” teaches you how to safely migrate your validator from one virtual service provider (AWS) to another (Digital Ocean). Having the same validator keys on two different instances could result in the slashing and freezing of my staked ether, but luckily there exists slashing protection in the form of EIP-3076, a JSON file with a list of all the blocks and attestations the client has made.
 * The ConsenSys Product Suite. We revamped our product page to help people get started with our suite of products: Codefi, Diligence, Infura, MetaMask, Quorum, and Truffle. Six products. One mission. To empower developers, enterprises, and people worldwide to access and build on Ethereum.

Want instant, scalable, and reliable API access to the Ethereum, Eth2, IPFS, and Filecoin networks? Sign up to start building for free today. Need more request volume and direct support? Just like our infrastructure, our pricing scales to fit your application.

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News

Infura | March 2021 Update

The Meteoric Rise of NFTs

If you’ve been following the crypto space lately, you’ve probably seen that Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have been the talk of almost every artist and creator. From the sale of Beeple’s “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” for $69.3M to NBA Top Shot surpassing $205 million in total sales within six months to EulerBeats generating more than $1.1. Million in royalties during its first week, interest in NFTs is at an all time high. Across the board, we have seen NFTs enable the financialization of digital goods: art, music, content, virtual land, gaming collectibles, and essentially anything that benefits from verified authenticity and provable ownership rights.

While artists have been continuously setting records with their sales, the NFT marketplaces and galleries have also been exceeding expectations. Currently, the gallery model, which curates an exclusive selection of art for buyers like a traditional art gallery, has been generating less volume compared to marketplaces, which are akin to an art bazaar where anyone can display their works for sale. For example, the curated nature of Nifty Gateway and SuperRare limits the number of artists who are allowed on the platforms, creating an allure of brand recognition and exclusivity compared to platforms like OpenSea and Rarible which allow anyone to post their NFT. That being said, both models have experienced immense growth in this NFT boom.

Monthly protocol users for Rarible, a leading NFT marketplace, hit an all time high for March, surpassing 58,000.

Data Source: Dune Analytics

Superare, the top NFT gallery, surpassed $15 million in volume for the month of March.

Data Source: Dune Analytics

Artists sold 2,000 works on SuperRare in March, marking an all-time high for the gallery.

Data Source: Dune Analytics

Currently, NFT aggregators, issuance protocols, and generalized marketplaces are driving the growth of the NFT space and are the more obvious market opportunities. Below are a handful of the leading art platforms and marketplaces today:

Source: Messari

It’s undeniable that the market is assigning real value to provable digital ownership and this new open creative economy is here to stay. Over time, we expect to see value continue to flow into these marketplaces and competition to heat up as new novel platforms are introduced. We also expect that the success of these platforms will ultimately come down to their ability to attract users and creators by devising markets for participants to easily mint, collect, showcase, and trade art and collectibles. The question now becomes: given the current NFT landscape, where are the opportunities and how can we build marketplaces to address the needs of this growing niche?

While there are many NFT marketplaces we could explore, we thought we would take the time to introduce a new project called Barter, recently built by a ConsenSys Academy student. We’ll show you how the project implemented an on-chain order book for NFT trading, and how they plugged in Infura and Truffle to get it off the ground quickly. After you review this project, you can better understand how these marketplaces can be created, and the additional opportunities that exist for them.


How I Built This: Barter

Barter is a project built by Robert Clark, a student from ConsenSys Academy that is specifically engineered for a future where video game assets are tradeable and where the Metaverse (as coined by Neal Stephenson) begins to emerge as a social phenomenon. People already buy, collect, and curate assets inside video games (characters, armor, weapons, etc) so the ability to trade them directly with other players would be explosive. With Barter, a direct trading interface between two people allows for real-time negotiation as well as new item discovery. This creates a more natural trading experience that is already the norm across games like Rocket League and Runescape.

In this section, we walk you through how this developer built Barter from the ground up, using Infura and Truffle.


Project Structure

Barter's user interface is quite simple, consisting of a one-page react app that can toggle between the “trade proposal” page and the “offers” page. Once a user has connected their Metamask account and added the recipient’s address, they click ‘Propose Trade’ and create a trade offer. A transaction prompt appears and allows them to send the offer on-chain. For the user on the other side of the trade, an offer will pop-up for them in the offers box, accessible via the button in the top right corner. This offer will give them a brief overview of the NFT and its price, along with an accept and reject button. If the user clicks accept and sends the prompted transaction, the trade will execute.

On the Solidity side, Barter was set up as an on-chain order book for NFT trading. In order to successfully complete an NFT trade between two users, one user first must create an offer and post it to the contract. Offers are address specific, so the user making the offer must know who they want to trade with ahead of time in order to successfully complete the trade. Once the offeror is done configuring their trade in the UI, they can proceed to posting a TradeOffer, an instance of which is shown below:

struct TradeOffer {
        address payable offerer;
        address payable asker;
        uint[] offer;
        uint[] ask;
        address[] offerContract;
        address[] askContract;
        uint offerLength;
        uint askLength;
        uint offerVal;
        uint askVal;
        uint feePaid;
        State state;
    }


This offer is made up of 4 main pieces of information;

1) the trader addresses,

2) arrays of offered and asked NFT IDs,

3) arrays of offered and asked NFT Contract addresses, and

4) an optional amount of ETH val that can be added to either side of the offer.

The contract tracks an array of every offer posted, and has many safeguards put in place to make sure there are no ways for NFTs or ETH to be sent around without proper completion of an offer. For example, the addOffer function as shown below is made up almost entirely of different require statements. In order to make an offer, the contract first must verify that the offeror actually owns the NFT, has submitted the right amount of ETH as a fee, and has tried to trade at least one NFT, among other verifications.

function addOffer(uint[] memory _offer, address[] memory _offerContract
                    , uint[] memory _ask, address[] memory _askContract
                    , uint _offerVal, uint _askVal, address payable _targetAddress) 
                    public payable stopInEmergency() returns (bool) {
 
        require(_offer.length >= 1 || _ask.length >= 1);
        require(_offer.length == _offerContract.length);
        require(_ask.length == _askContract.length);
        require((_offerVal+fee) == msg.value);
        for(uint i = 0; i < _offer.length; i++) {
            ERC721 con = ERC721(_offerContract[i]);
            require(approvedERC721[_offerContract[i]]);
            require(con.ownerOf(_offer[i]) == msg.sender);
            require(con.isApprovedForAll(msg.sender, address(this)));
        }
 
        for(uint i = 0; i < _ask.length; i++) {
            require(approvedERC721[_askContract[i]]);
        }
 
        emit LogOfferAdded(offerCount, msg.sender);
        offersByAddress[_targetAddress].push(offerCount);
        offerCountByAddress[_targetAddress] = offerCountByAddress[_targetAddress]+1;
        offersCreatedByAddress[msg.sender].push(offerCount);
        offersCreatedCountByAddress[msg.sender] = offersCreatedCountByAddress[msg.sender]+1;
                offers[offerCount] = TradeOffer({offerer: msg.sender
            , asker: _targetAddress
            , offer: _offer
            , offerContract:_offerContract
            , ask: _ask
            , askContract:_askContract
            , offerLength:_offer.length
            , askLength:_ask.length
            , offerVal: _offerVal
            , askVal:_askVal
            , feePaid:fee
            , state: State.Active});
        offerCount = offerCount + 1;
        
        return true;
    }


There is a similar set of checks for accepting a trade, as the original offeror may have ditched all the NFTs they originally had after the offeree took too long to accept. This is slightly redundant from a security standpoint but it protects against offers being created when they have no hope of being accepted.


Plugging in Infura and Truffle

Using Truffle along with Infura made the connection to a testnet (Ropsten) straightforward and easy. There was a declaration of the mnemonic from the HDWalletProvider along with our Infura ProjectID. Then we simply acquired some Ropsten ETH from one of the faucets available and used the boilerplate Truffle code to migrate to Ropsten. Once it was successfully deployed, we got the contract IDs and replaced the contract variables in our React code to point to the correct contracts.

ropsten: {
   provider: () => new HDWalletProvider(mnemonic, `https://ropsten.infura.io/v3/${infuraKey}`),
   network_id: 3,       // Ropsten's id
   gas: 5500000,        // Ropsten has a lower block limit than mainnet
   confirmations: 2,    // # of confs to wait between deployments. (default: 0)
   timeoutBlocks: 200,  // # of blocks before a deployment times out  (minimum/default: 50)
   skipDryRun: true     // Skip dry run before migrations? (default: false for public nets )
   }//,



Future State

The on-chain order book design choice of this project has certain limitations. Every offer must be a transaction, which can get expensive when Ethereum is nearing full utilization. But if this project is deployed on a high throughput layer two (L2) solution, potentially one with video game assets with low enough value to merit trading en masse, this interface could be a very useful tool.

Changes to the user interface, from a matching engine perspective, could open up other possible extensions for this project. Unlike the OpenSea bulletin board approach, the trading interface approach could be extended to allow users to set preferences for acquiring different types of items, and a multi-party trade matching engine could sort through different ways to help them acquire that item. Say party 3 has an item you want, and you have what party 2 wants, but not what party 3 wants. The interface could set up a 3 way trade to satisfy all parties involved.

One final nuance that is interesting to consider is that usually when interfaces are built like this, they are for one specific game. Because of the interoperability of ERC-721 this can be extended to trade any two things of value. You could trade a digital painting for Metaverse outfit, or even swap deeds to your homes with a friend.


Conclusion

Overall, we’re fascinated by the increase in interest and evolution of NFTs and expect to see even more activity in the coming year. We’re proud that developers are leveraging Infura to build decentralized apps that allow creators to share art and interact directly with an enthusiastic community of collectors.

Building an NFT project? Infura is a critical part of your toolkit. Sign up for free and unlock robust, scalable tools for Ethereum and IPFS development.

Twitter | Newsletter | Community | Docs | Contact | Open Roles

Huge thanks to Robert Kruszynski and Mattison Asher for their contributions to this guide. For more Web3 tutorials, check out the Infura Blog and ConsenSys Academy.

How Barter Built a Direct NFT Trading Interface for Real-time Negotiation

Add 1 million daily requests to your Ethereum API subscription for only $200 USD per month!

Ethereum Request Packs are here! Now Infura customers (on any subscription tier) can add increments of 1,000,000 daily requests to their account for $200 per month!

Say you’re subscribed to the Team tier and are currently allotted 1,000,000 requests per day. You can now add an additional 1,000,000 requests per day, bringing you to a total of 2,000,000 total daily requests for $425 per month. You can add multiple Request Packs directly in your Dashboard until you reach a limit of 100MM total daily requests. If you need more than 100MM/day, please reach out to us and we will set you up with a custom account.


How to Get Started

To add Ethereum Request Packs to your account, click Change Plan in your Dashboard, select Request Packs, and designate the number of packs you’d like to purchase.

Once you've successfully checked out, your Billing page will be updated to reflect your new daily request limit.

That's it! If you need help at any time, join the Infura Community to connect with the team or drop us an email at support@infura.io.


Other Updates from Infura:


Why You Should Use ITX Instead of Building Your Own In-House Relayer

We know how frustrating stuck transactions can be so that’s why we’re rigorously working to solve transaction management friction for the industry. Check out this post where we outline three critical problems that currently prevent developers and DeFi users from getting more efficient transactions on Ethereum, and how you can use Infura Transactions to eliminate this friction to create a better end user experience.


ICYMI, MetaMask Launched a Custom Networks API to Improve Layer 2 Support

The API now enables developers to recommend Layer 2 networks, like Polygon (formerly Matic), Arbitrum, and Optimism; sidechains like SKALE and xDAI. Once connected and configured, these networks are added to the user’s network menu, enabling the user to switch between networks. If you’re operating a dApp that integrates with MetaMask, and want to start onboarding more users to Layer 2 networks, check out MetaMask’s latest post.


Notice: Eth2 Public Beta Deprecation of Project IDs

ICYMI: Our Eth2 API is publicly available! Please note that on April 1, project IDs used in our Eth2 private beta will no longer be accepted in the public beta. More details and what to do.


We’re Ready for the Berlin Fork

Ethereum mainnet is currently targeting the Berlin fork for April 14, 2021 at block height 12,244,000. Using Infura? No changes required! Running your own node? How to get fork-ready.


New Developer Tutorials!

 * Want to jump into Filecoin and start building something? This tutorial will get you up and running quickly by creating a simple Node.js script using Infura and the Filecoin network.
 * How to Access the Eth2 API Pyrmont testnet

Want instant, scalable, and reliable API access to the Ethereum, Eth2, IPFS, and Filecoin networks? Sign up for our Core service to start building for free today. Need more request volume and direct support? Check out Infura+ to pick the right plan for your project.

Twitter | Newsletter | Community | Docs | Contact | We're Hiring!

Infura product updates and feature announcements.

Infura Product & Features

Product & Features

Introducing Ethereum Request Packs!

Want to jump into Filecoin and start building something? The Infura API makes it easier to interact with the Filecoin Network by abstracting away some of the complex workflows and requirements. There's no need to spin up a node or directly call a Lotus daemon!

This tutorial will get you up and running quickly by creating a simple Node.js script using Infura and the Filecoin network. It will show you how to:

-Sign in to the Infura API;

-Create a Node.js script to 1) check if a given string is a valid Filecoin address, and 2) return the balance of that address if it is valid;

-Discover more ways to interact with the Filecoin network using the Infura API.


Take me to the tutorial


How to Build on the Filecoin Network Using the Infura API

想研究 Filecoin 并开始开发一些东西吗？Infura API 通过简化一些复杂的工作流程和要求，让与 Filecoin 网络交互这件事变得更容易。您不再需要启动一个独立节点或直接调用一个 Lotus daemon！

本教程将带您快速入门，教您创建一个使用 Infura 和 Filecoin 网络的简单的 Node.js 脚本。它将告诉您如何：

 * 登录到 Infura 的 API；
 * 创建一个 Node.js 脚本
 * 1）检查一个给定的字符串是否是有效的 Filecoin 地址，
 * 2）如果是有效的，返回该地址的余额；
 * 发现更多使用 Infura API 与 Filecoin 网络互动的方法。


浏览教程详情

Posts by Cheryl Douglass 🧡

Infura | March 2021 Update

How Barter Built a Direct NFT Trading Interface for Real-time Negotiation

Introducing Ethereum Request Packs!

How to Build on the Filecoin Network Using the Infura API

如何使用 Infura API 在 Filecoin 网络上进行开发