Onchain releases white paper on Ant consensus algorithm

Recently, Onchain released the Ant consensus algorithm white paper. The white paper describes a general consensus mechanism module dBFT (delegated BFT), and proposes an improved Byzantine fault-tolerant algorithm that can be applied to blockchain systems.

Antminer is a protocol based on blockchain technology. Through Antminer, users can digitize the assets and rights of the physical world, and use peer-to-peer networks to register, issue, transfer, trade, clear and settle financial services through a decentralized network protocol. Antminer can issue company shares recognized by China's Contract Law and Company Law. The target market is not only the digital currency circle, but also mainstream Internet finance. Antminer can be used for equity crowdfunding, P2P online lending, digital asset management, smart contracts, etc. Antminer's first market entry point is equity crowdfunding.

Onchain's main business is to develop and operate the Antshares system, and also provide customized blockchain services to other financial institutions. In November last year, the Antshares project successfully raised 2,100 bitcoins. After several months of intensive development, Onchain recently released the Antshares consensus algorithm white paper.

Regarding the latest consensus mechanism, we interviewed Onchain team CTO Zhang Zhengwen, who compared the advantages and disadvantages of different consensus mechanisms and introduced the next plans of the Onchain team and the Ant system.

8btc: Please briefly describe what this consensus mechanism is like?

Zhang Zhengwen: The consensus mechanism adopted by Antminer is based on the "Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance" algorithm proposed by Castro and Liskov, which has been improved to make it applicable to blockchain systems. Byzantine fault tolerance technology is widely used in distributed systems, such as distributed file systems, distributed collaboration systems, cloud computing, etc. We have mainly made the following improvements:

1) Improve the request response mode of the C/S architecture to a peer node mode suitable for P2P networks;

2) Improve the static consensus participating nodes into dynamic consensus participating nodes that can dynamically enter and exit;

3) A voting mechanism based on the proportion of equity holdings is designed for the generation of consensus participating nodes, and the consensus participating nodes (accounting nodes) are determined by voting;

4) The introduction of digital certificates in the blockchain solves the problem of authenticating the true identity of the accounting node in voting;

8btc: Why did you finally adopt such a solution?

Zhang Zhengwen: As a distributed ledger system, the economic model of blockchain determines that each participant does not need to trust other participants, which is called trustlessness. The Byzantine Generals Problem describes how participants can reach a consensus in a trustless environment, and Byzantine Fault Tolerance is the solution to this problem. In addition, the blockchain network environment is very complex, and it will face problems such as network delays, transmission errors, software errors, security vulnerabilities, hacker intrusions, and various malicious nodes. Byzantine Fault Tolerance is a solution that can tolerate these errors.

8btc: What are the advantages and disadvantages of the consensus mechanism adopted by Ant compared with PoW, PoS, and DPoS?

Zhang Zhengwen: PoW即工作量证明, which is a very clever method. Its advantages are:
1) The algorithm is simple and easy to implement;
2) Nodes can reach consensus without exchanging additional information;
3) It would cost a lot to destroy the system;

Its disadvantages are also very obvious:
1) Waste of energy;
2) It is difficult to shorten the block confirmation time;
3) The new blockchain must find a different hashing algorithm, otherwise it will face Bitcoin’s computing power attack;
4) It is easy to fork and needs to wait for multiple confirmations;
5) There is never finality, and a checkpoint mechanism is needed to make up for the finality;

PoS即权益证明, which changes the computing power in PoW into system stake. The greater the stake, the greater the probability of becoming the next bookkeeper. The advantage of this mechanism is that it does not consume as much electricity as Pow, but it also has many disadvantages:
1) Without professionalization, participants with interests may not necessarily want to participate in bookkeeping;
2) It is easy to cause forks and requires waiting for multiple confirmations;
3) There is never finality, and a checkpoint mechanism is needed to make up for the finality;

Based on PoS, DPoS professionalizes the role of bookkeepers, first selecting bookkeepers through equity, and then bookkeepers take turns to keep accounts. This approach still does not solve the finality problem.

dBFT机制adopted by Antminer is to select the bookkeepers by rights and interests, and then the bookkeepers reach a consensus through the Byzantine Fault Tolerance algorithm. The advantages of this method are:
1) Professional bookkeeper;
2) Any type of error can be tolerated;
3) Bookkeeping is done by multiple people in collaboration, each block is final and will not fork;
4) The reliability of the algorithm has strict mathematical proof;

shortcoming:
1) When 1/3 or more of the bookkeepers stop working, the system will be unable to provide services;
2) When 1/3 or more of the bookkeepers work together to commit evil, and all other bookkeepers are exactly divided into two network islands, the malicious bookkeepers can cause the system to fork, but will leave cryptographic evidence;
To summarize, the core point of the dBFT mechanism is to ensure the finality of the system to the greatest extent possible, so that the blockchain can be suitable for real financial application scenarios.

8btc: Since the crowdfunding was completed last year, the Ant Financial team has been keeping a low profile. What else has the Ant Financial team done since the release of the consensus mechanism white paper?

Zhang Zhengwen: The Ant Group has done three things:

1) Improved the Antminer core protocol and designed the dBFT consensus mechanism. We recently released the dBFT white paper. In addition, the Antminer smart contract system has also been enhanced. Now you can directly read any data on the blockchain in the Antminer contract script and process a group of data. The ability of logical judgment has also been enhanced. Provide RPC interface. Now developers can access nodes through the JSON-RPC protocol to facilitate secondary development.

2) Developed a new version of the client. We are currently designing a Xiaoyi client based on HTML5 and JavaScript. It communicates with the Xiaoyi node through the RPC protocol and can run on almost any platform: Windows, Linux, MAC, IOS, Android, Windows Phone.

3) Strategic cooperation with many enterprises and financial institutions The institutions that have cooperated or are negotiating cooperation with Onchain and the Antminer project include: banks, P2P lending, exchanges, digital evidence storage platforms, cloud computing platforms, incubators, etc. In the future, we will continue to expand our business and promote Antminer and blockchain technology to various fields.

8btc: What are the follow-up plans after the consensus mechanism is released?

Zhang Zhengwen: We will launch the official version of the Antminer network soon and start the second round of crowdfunding plan before that. On the other hand, we will work with partners to strengthen the promotion of Antminer in various fields to make it the first blockchain project in China. Finally, we will continue to expand the team and hope to expand the team to about 15 people within half a year. We also hope that experts who are interested in the blockchain industry will join Onchain and Antminer.

Full text of the white paper: http://www.onchain.com/paper/66c6773b.pdf

Reporter: Meng Dada
Source: Babbitt Information (http://www.8btc.com/onchain-paper-antshares)