Avalaunch
Topic: Blockchain
Source: Avalaunch
MLA Citation:“Avalanche Consensus.” Avalanche Docs, docs.avax.network/learn/platform-overview/avalanche-consensus/.
Analysis:
This week I worked with trying to understand one of the new and upcoming blockchain businesses, Avalanche. One of the new ideas that Avalanche brings to the table is the idea of a leaderless consensus. To start I learned about the history of consensus, The first type of consensus, known as classical consensus - where every node knows each other, and there are a few main controlling nodes. Almost similar to a monarchy. The second type of consensus is the Nakamoto Consensus, which is the consciousness used for blockchain. In this consensus, the nodes do not need to know each other, many nodes can vote ( permission-less) and the consensus is kept in check through competition. The last and most current well-known consensus is the Avalanche consensus, this is basically a free for all consensus. Everyone can vote, no leaders, and is all done by all the single nodes themselves, similar to democracy. To explain a little more in Avalanche the nodes volunteer to part take in a consensus where they choose between the validation of a certain transaction or the denial. Based on the node decision they will be given a color. The rest will be explained through an example situation, imagine you are online and the people are choosing between different food: pizza, fish, chips, and porridge. In this case the undecided are white, the pizza is pink, the fish is blue, the chips are green and the porridge is yellow. When the voting begins if a node white encounters blue, the white node will adopt the new color, blue. If a blue node encounters a red node, and the red nodes happen to be more chosen than blue then the less prevalent node blue will adopt the color red. This cycle happens over and over again until all the nodes are the same color, and at that instance, the answer to the validation of the transaction is complete, and the process will begin again on a new transaction. Keep in mind that this whole process happens in a few seconds total, making this not only fast but completely democratic.
Why is this important to blockchain?
Well, the main answer to this question is that this is the method of validating transactions, similar to the blockchain proof of work concept. Through the consensus, we can validate certain transactions and add them to the blockchain in the Avalanche system. Additionally, this allows for scalability since thousands of nodes can help and work with the consensus at the same time. The last reason is security, through avalanche one would need control of 80% of the nodes on the system in order to hack or even attack the system, making it practically impossible since it costs a lot of money to own millions of tokens, which then serve as nodes on the system. In Conclusion, blockchain, in general, is based on the idea of a consensus, therefore having a developed way of achieving good consensus like an Avalanche is very necessary.
In conclusion, over the next few days, I hope to complete reading the 70-page long avalanche wallpaper that goes into depth on all the technicalities of the avalanche and its unique consensus.
