Pioneers
Groundbreaking Blockchain OS Projects — Decentralized Slot Machine
A series on the Web2 and Web3 pioneers on The Blockchain OS.
Here’s to the pioneers on The Blockchain OS. To the makers and mavericks of the future. Here’s to history in the making on The Blockchain OS. To the developers who are pioneering on The Blockchain OS, developing scalable smart contracts with the rich software tools, libraries, and all the services they’re used to in Web2.
And here’s to Webchefs’ developer Kamil for designing these incredible decentralized apps. From mobile apps to bespoke software, Kamil used The Blockchain OS to build his first decentralized project (while bringing blockchain technology to the many).
Why move to blockchain, Kamil?
“I have a funny story, where we were filling in a form to enter a foreign country. We filled in all our personal information, passport numbers, date of birth, you know, the usual. And then we got a reply from the same domain — and it was bugged; we received an excel file to open — it was something to do with COVID, so it was probably very rushed during its development and perhaps not all the bugs were addressed. Essentially it meant hackers had our passport numbers and knew everything about us. It’s a typical example of a central point of failure, and why I believe we should decentralize.
Another reason is with these big players in tech. We all have Google or Apple accounts, and while we feel we can’t live without their services, we don’t really know what they do with our data. I see this with my clients as well — they fear these hosting companies because of all the sensitive business data shared with them.”
What about your clients?
“When it comes to blockchain, there’s the tech leader perspective and then there’s the client perspective. Blockchain is really expensive if you compare it to the typical Web2 applications. We deal with small to medium-sized businesses, so to make them pay high amounts in gas fees to check or to do a simple transaction is impossible. It means we wouldn’t be delivering on business value as a client-based company.
Then from a tech perspective, to suddenly drop the programming languages that we know, and learn Solidity to be able to build blockchain applications (also without the tooling and framework we have now) doesn’t make any sense. So, that’s what held us up until we found The Blockchain OS. It solves the scalability problem and also, the high costs.”
Is this a familiar learning path?
“The Blockchain OS gives us a familiarity to our process, it has the same CLI (Command-Line Interface) as Linux, which makes us fluent when it comes to using this — some of the libraries were already there, and the syntax is familiar. It meant we didn’t need to trawl through all the tutorials for learning how to code with blockchain, only the ones Cartesi provided. This allows us to bridge the gap and ease our way into Web3 development.
We also learned how to think differently. I’ve learned that not everything needs to go into the blockchain, just the relevant bits. You can have an application that works outside the blockchain, up to a point in which you have some conflict. So only when blockchain is needed to arbitrate something, that’s when it can step in. When everybody’s agreeing with everything, you don’t need to put it on the blockchain.”
We heard you were developing a decentralized game
“We’re currently developing a decentralized slot machine: A lot of slot machines now are digital, but the problem is, you don’t really know whether you’re playing a probability game, or you’re just being fooled by the online casino to keep putting more money into the machine.
So, imagine having the transparency of the code behind the machine. You would know whether you’re playing a probability game, or whether it’s a scam. Decentralizing the slot machines means bringing trust back to gaming. And that’s what we’ve been creating: a trusted slot machine for online casinos.”
What else are you cooking up?
“We’re also creating a public sales ledger for a memorabilia marketplace. In this industry there’s a problem of never knowing whether you’re buying a genuine item, or something fake. But if you have a sales record to this particular item and a certificate tied to it on blockchain, you can verify that.
You would for example see how it originated in 1997 and you would have this whole track of sales with this particular certificate. There are certificates now, but they tend to get lost or forged. Our marketplace would give you the certainty that you’re not buying a fake, since blockchain can track things in a trusted way, to the very beginning.”
Can JavaScript work with blockchain?
“So, in web development a really common stack is having a piece of technology to do the front end, which is the part the user interacts with. And sometimes you use a similar stack based on JavaScript, or even a different stack on the back end, which is the part that processes what the user needs. Let me give you an example: Let’s say you have a store, a place in which you see all the items you navigate to, filter by price, color, etc. All the stuff you click on, that’s the front end. And when you make a purchase with your card, to process that and update the inventory, this logic is at the back end. And this is one of the amazing things The Blockchain OS is bringing to blockchain and allowing developers to easily do.
For our Trusted Casino Slot Machine we’re pioneering an Angular and JavaScript path on The Blockchain OS. The good thing about JavaScript is it’s dynamic, but doesn’t give you a lot of guarantees. You’d need Typescript for that, which is like a simulator that says ‘hang on, this is not going to work, this is going to break because there’s no logic here’. So for our next project we’ll move towards TypeScript, make use of a program that transforms TypeScript into JavaScript, so that we can use it on the browser, or even on the back end.”
SQLite databases. Tell us about that.
“When I first heard about The Blockchain OS I thought it was like a blockchain hosting provider, but it’s totally different. The moment when we realized that this OS was a game changer, is when we started our first decentralized application using a SQLite database.
We could transfer most of the logic we normally do into the Cartesi Machine. And then we tried more databases, thinking this is awesome — we can store transactions in a SQLite database, which makes it immediately interesting for business cases.”
Is now a good time to enter Web3?
“For mainstream developers, or Web2 developers to enter Web3, it’s a big fat yes from me. And the technology is mature enough to make sense for the future. If you don’t brush up your knowledge as a developer, you might become obsolete at some point in your career — that’s why I believe that now is the time to move to Web3.
The Blockchain OS gives you the syntax that you already know, enabling you to deliver a decentralized app without learning Solidity. You can just follow the tutorial and go for it. Yes, you’ll ask some really stupid questions like I did and yes, you’ll go off track sometimes, but the Cartesi team will give very concrete messages and clear guidance along the way.”
About Webchefs
Webchefs is a team of approachable nerds that delivers highly maintainable software and is not afraid of the most formidable fin-tech challenges. From finance, econometrics and economic backgrounds, Webchef leaders can split any business model into atoms and provide a cohesive user experience with cutting-edge software solutions.
As professionals, Webchefs understand requirements and priorities but look for partnerships and communication between teams. They believe in casual conversations that bring out the best ideas, even in challenging environments.
About Kamil
After graduation and defending his thesis on the open-source software development model in the information society, Kamil left his homeland to explore other parts of the world. A few years later, together with a fellow graduate, he set up a software development company.
Being enthusiastic about the human side of technology, Webchefs started to attract like-minded people, and he found himself leading skilled teams of nerdy and positive people.
In his free time, Kamil loves to do basic woodwork, ride bicycles, take cold baths, meditate, and occasionally swirl around corners in a convertible he rescued from a junkyard.
About Cartesi
The Blockchain OS is a decentralized layer-2 infrastructure that supports Linux and mainstream software components. For the first time, developers can code scalable smart contracts with rich software tools, libraries, and the services they’re used to, bridging the gap between mainstream software and blockchain.
Cartesi is enabling millions of new startups and their developers to use The Blockchain OS and bring Linux applications on board. With a groundbreaking virtual machine, optimistic rollups, and side-chains, Cartesi paves the way for developers of all kinds, to build the next generation of blockchain apps.
Welcome to The Blockchain OS, home to what’s next.
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