Good blockchains are known for providing additional security for transactions, asset storage, and more, as well as offering their users the chance to have more say over their digital assets by being decentralized. Many of these blockchains, however, are becoming hugely congested and this has led to much slower transaction speeds and high gas fees.
In an attempt to streamline this technology, without giving up security or user experience, developers have created some unique Layer-2 scaling solutions. One such solution is Arbitrum.
Arbitrum focuses on providing investors with a cheap, fast and scalable network — what Ethereum still struggles with despite its Merge upgrade in September 2022. After Arbitrum came up with this innovative technique, developers have flocked to it to build their decentralised applications (dApps).
What is Arbitrum?
Arbitrum is a Layer-2 solution blockchain that is designed to enhance Ethereum smart contracts in terms of speed and scalability with the inclusion of additional privacy features. The platform makes it easy for developers to execute unmodified Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) contracts and Ethereum transactions at Layer-2 while still benefiting from the security feature of Ethereum’s (Layer-1).
Arbitrum was created to address some of the shortcomings of current Ethereum-based smart contracts. The issues described include long transactions and high execution costs and less scalability.
Arbitrum adopts a technique known as transaction rollup to log batches of transactions submitted on the Ethereum main chain and execute them on more scalable layer-2 sidechains. This process helps release the storage burden that Ethereum is struggling with while enabling a new class of robust layer-2-based dApps.
How Does it Work?
Arbitrum as a type of technology is also known as an optimistic rollup. This technology allows Ethereum Smart Contracts to scale by sending messages between smart contracts and those in the Arbitrum second chain layer. In addition, most of the transaction processing is completed at Layer-2 while Arbitrum records the results in the main chain. The system drastically increases its working speed and efficiency through this process. Any validator is allowed to post a rollup block and also confirm the validity of another block. The term ‘rollup’ describes how a validator can use public information to reconstruct a chain history from optimised logs. The protocol ensures that the code runs correctly.
Like many typical blockchains, individual nodes can participate in the Arbitrum chain. Validator nodes observe the chain’s state and full nodes, helping to combine layer-1 transactions. Aggregators that send transactions to the layer-1 chain get rewarded in ETH. Other user transaction fees are distributed to other network participants such as validators.
This Layer-2 solution project introduces a challenging step for block rollup, which ensures that other validators check the block’s correctness and issue a probe (challenge) if they believe it is false. If the block is proven wrong or the challenge proves to be unjustified, then the validators who attempt falsehood will have their assets seized. This algorithm ensures that all validators always play fair and accept the consequences of violation.
The platform also has the Arbitrum Virtual Machine (AVM) as its custom virtual machine. The AVM was designed to perform similar functions as EVM (Ethereum virtual machine). Arbitrum launched the first technical upgrade, Nitro on August 31 in a bid to establish an execution environment as close to the EVM as possible, which acts as a second layer to Ethereum. Nitro changes the execution of smart contracts from interpreting their bytecode on AVM to compiling it into WebAssembly and executing it using standard WebAssembly execution strategy (that is a magnitude faster than interpreting). The architecture of AVM is now used for multi-round narrowing of the conflict scope on dispute resolution.
Why use Arbitrum?
There are many reasons, from the cost of development to the strictness and security of the consensus algorithm. Arbitrum is trusted to always execute a validator’s transaction if they are acting honestly, even if all of the other validators attempt to collectively cheat. Whereas many chains require a majority or two-thirds of honest participants. the concept of AnyTrust Guarantee allows anyone who chooses to become a validator to have a guarantee of honest behavior. Moreover, Arbitrum offers validators the ability to stand up to obtainment of their rights and deserved currency.
Developers can also use Arbitrum with the familiarity of Ethereum programming tools. As Arbitrum is absolutely compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) there’s no need to use additional compilers, rewrite code, or download new extra tools. Arbitrum is prided on scalability, security and efficiency. It allows developers to deploy large contracts beyond the Ethereum contract size and transaction gas limits. All these are achieved with familiar programming languages and tools.
What Makes Arbitrum Unique?
The Ethereum mainnet has been criticized for different reasons which include its lack of scalability, high gas and slow transaction speeds. Many networks have been introduced in a bid to solve Ethereum’s issues. Some of these networks include Cardano (ADA), Polkadot (DOT), and EOS (EOS), which are different blockchains powered by proof-of-stake (PoS) algorithms.
Arbitrum’s problem-solving techniques differ from these other solutions: Arbitrum operates as a separate layer to relieve the ETH mainnet from excessive transactions by facilitating the validation of smart contracts through the technique of optimistic Arbitrum rollups. Although other protocols also work towards achieving similar improvements, the Arbitrum network currently stands out for its Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatibility, in other words, developers do not have to go into the process of learning a new coding language to be able to build their dApps within the Arbitrum mainnet.
Benefits of Arbitrum: Why is it Hypersea’s Choice?
High EVM compatibility
The platform is considered to be one of the most EVM-compatible rollups. There is compatibility with EVM at the bytecode level, and any language, such as Solidity and Vyper, can be compiled to EVM. This makes developing much easier and more efficient for Hypersea.
Low Cost
Arbitrum, as a layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum, is not only designed to increase Ethereum transaction throughput. But at the same time to minimize transaction costs. Owing to the highly efficient roll-up technology, Arbitrum is able to cut costs to a minimum. Although the transaction costs are lower, the project still provides good incentives for validators. Hypersea places much premium on the affordability of both gas fees and trading fees.
Provision of Powerful Developer Tools
The Arbitrum team has gone into many ways to minimize stress when building a layer-2 solution. As such, they have produced easy-to-decode developer documentation for Arbitrum, and developers can start using tools that already exist on Ethereum. They don’t need to download anything specific to this project, such as a plugin or a compiler like Hardhat.
Scalability
By moving storage and computations of the Layer-1 blockchain, it allows for much faster TPS and very affordable gas fees.
Trustless Security
Arbitrum benefits from the proven security of Ethereum. Hypersea is also bent on maintaining the utmost security for users.
Good Ecosystem
Arbitrum builds partnerships with various Ethereum DApps and infrastructure projects, including Uniswap, Sushiswap, and many others.
Conclusion
The Arbitrum Layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum is a powerful tool that has appealed to big players in the crypto space, including the likes of UniSwap, SushiSwap, and more. Its technology has been built to be Ethereum compatible, implying that developers can easily transfer their DApps over to benefit from faster transaction speeds and lower gas fees and scalability.
The proven security, scalability and efficiency identified with Arbitrum are a good reason Hypersea builds on it.
