Temperature Check: Should former xDai team be involved in future Gnosis Chain development?

Summary

Following the token merger (STAKE to GNO), the former xDai team has finalized the transfer of infrastructure and assets to the GnosisDAO technology team. While many prior responsibilities of the team have been reallocated to GnosisDAO core team members, xDai team engineers are still interested in working on a focused scope of activities including:

Technical support for the consensus layer/execution layer (GBC/GC) merge Rollup research, analysis and support Open-source explorer development – Blockscout Participation in select ecosystem working groups Research on trustless bridges Security issue consultation Gnosis Beacon Chain validator support

This post provides an overview of the infrastructure transfer to date. It will be followed by a snapshot temperature check for the community to determine if they would like to see the former xDai team continue working on this focused scope or would prefer to keep these tasks in-house with the internal Gnosis core team.

What has been accomplished

The token merger has involved physical and knowledge transfer of many important items from the xDai operations team to the Gnosis team. Gnosis is now responsible for the ownership and management of all essential chain operations. The following have been transferred from xDai to Gnosis:

Public RPC endpoint hosting and maintenance Gnosis Beacon Chain explorer Bridge infrastructure management Bridge governance management Project GitHub repositories Validator onboarding processes Public facing websites, domains, and hosting Documentation sites Marketing activities and business development Community management Social media accounts (Twitter, Discord, Substack) Immunefi Bug Bounty Program Listings on Centralized Exchanges (Huobi, AscendEX, Gate.io) Revenue from compounding and fees on xDai Bridge Revenue from compounding and fees on Omni Bridge on ETH<>GC, ETH<>BSC bridges Revenue from gas fees collected by EIP-1559 implementation on Gnosis Chain Moving Forward Now that primary daily operations are under Gnosis control, the former xDai team is assessing options for future involvement. Their engineering team is interested in continued work, research, and consultation in several specific areas outlined below.

Consensus layer/Execution layer (Gnosis Beacon Chain / Gnosis Chain ) Merge

The merge is fast approaching and there are many moving pieces to the upgrade. While it will be coordinated and executed by the Gnosis internal team, the xDai team would be available for technical consultation, assistance, and troubleshooting preceding and following the merge.

Provide technical support for merge preparation and execution Consult as needed on technical questions and issues Provide expertise and answer questions related to the current GC/GBC implementations which were developed and deployed by the xDai team Conduct research on related merge topics and best practices within the ecosystem

Rollup research, analysis and support

L2 rollups are an area of continued interest. Optimism on Gnosis Chain is experiencing increasing volume and projects are exploring rollup environments. The xDai team spearheaded these deployments and would like to continue with their development and optimization.

Analyze usage and perform stress testing on current implementations Tune parameters to maximize throughput Explore interoperability between L1/L2 environments Research zk rollups and deploy test environments for further research

Open-source explorer – Blockscout

Blockscout has been the primary explorer for Gnosis Chain since its inception. Updates, new feature implementation and ongoing support should be prioritized for Gnosis Chain execution-layer environments.

Hosting and supporting Blockscout instances for Gnosis Chain and Gnosis Chain Testnet on Blockscout’s premises Rebranding of Blockscout to follow the new Gnosis Chain brand guidelines Premium modules such as Blockscout Account, Smart contract verification, App store, etc. Priority support and priority updates Blockscout for Optimism on Gnosis Chain (unofficial deployment of Optimism)

Participation in select ecosystem working groups

To stay up-to-date with current deployments, issues and other relevant topics the team would maintain participation in certain working groups.

Participate in relevant groups at the xDai team’s discretion. Retain access to new and existing workgroups and leave extraneous groups.

Research on trustless bridges

Trustless bridges are an exciting area of research relevant to the Gnosis Beacon Chain implementation. We would explore methods and work towards a proof-of-concept bridge that does not need relayers when moving assets between Ethereum and Gnosis Chain.

Research and define requirements for trustless bridge implementation Establish working model and PoC

Security issue consultation

The xDai team has in-depth knowledge and expertise with the current codebase. Should an issue arise the team would be available to research, analyze and consult on possible solutions.

Maintain open communication channels related to security concerns Provide assistance and advice should security-related issues arise

Gnosis Beacon Chain validator support

The xDai team has been involved with onboarding for GBC validators since the chain launch. The team would like to continue with onboarding assistance for new validators and community management of the current validator set.

Provide assistance to Gnosis Beacon Chain validators in all areas related to initial setup and operations. Community management activities (troubleshooting, recommendations, answering questions, providing resources) for current Gnosis Beacon Chain validators.

Community Input

We would like to hear from the GnosisDAO community about their preferences for continued involvement of the xDai team. Would the community like to support the xDai external team or prefer to incubate and support an internal team managed by Gnosis for the aforementioned activities?

In this advisory format, the xDai team would retain 100% autonomy and responsibilities would be limited to the tasks outlined above. In this capacity, the xDai team would be available for consultation and peer review but would not be responsible for execution or coordination of essential tasks and/or remediation of any bugs/concerns/issues.

In addition to feedback on this post we plan to conduct a snapshot temperature check to gauge community interest in the xDai team continuing to work with the Gnosis team.