#TheAtomicSpreadOut — Sentinel
On the 29th of June, Dokia Capital redelegated 4 million ATOMs to smaller validators that perform well and have consistently contributed to this ecosystem.
Now we‘re on a mission to convince you to join us in our effort to further decentralize the Hub’s voting power.
If you want to learn more about why we decided to redelegate most of our stake: click-click
So in order to help you decide on which small validator is best suited for your own #AtomSpreadOut, we’ve decided to showcase validators that we trust and give you a better sense of who they are and why they deserve your delegations.
Today we’ll be covering Sentinel, so let’s go!
Why should you consider delegating to Sentinel?
Some Key Points:
- Never slashed
- Uptime: 100%
- Commission: 20%
- Voting Power: 0.41%
- Focused on: Technical contributions and Growth
But Sentinel is a special validator whose metrics are overshadowed by their valuable contributions to the growth of Cosmos. They are a great choice for $ATOM holders that are looking for a validator whose hard work and dedication to this project are unquestionable.
Context will make the difference between a good choice and a great choice, so let’s pass the mic to Sentinel to give you a better sense of who they are and what they stand for.
When and why did Sentinel join the Cosmos ecosystem?
Sentinel joined Cosmos in early 2018 with the purpose of contributing to Cosmos’s journey towards making the Internet of Blockchain a reality. We believe in their vision and have been committed to growing this ecosystem by creating a new and better paradigm for decentralized networks. We believed this would be possible through the introduction of a truly democratic inter-blockchain communication protocol.
In addition to the fact that the IBC protocol can effectively be utilized for communication between different networks that have distinct consensus mechanisms and structural schematics (e.g ZCash/Cosmos), Sentinel believes that the IBC protocol is extremely effective for transaction scalability and dAPP related efficiency through the introduction of the Hub/Zone model.
The Cosmos ecosystem enabled Sentinel to establish its own native chain and governance at the ‘Hub’ layer, while dVPN applications being built on Sentinel reside in either shared zones or on their own native zones depending on the throughput requirements for these applications. For an in-depth understanding of why we decided to join Cosmos please see:
What is your main differentiator as a validator?
We adhere to high standards when it comes to our infrastructure, including the use of a dedicated server system with high-security measures, but the key differentiator Sentinel’s focus on the code and our contributions to the Cosmos community and ecosystem as a whole.
The team has proven its ability to manage and maintain a validator under unfavorable circumstances with its participation and victories in Game of Stakes and the Game of Zones.
Why should ATOM holders redelegate to Sentinel?
We believe that the number 1 reason that makes Sentinel worthy of delegations is our undisputed commitment to the wellbeing of the Cosmos network and our constant strive to contribute and add value to this ecosystem.
Our efforts to ensure a successful and thriving Cosmos ecosystem are known to many community members and leaders but we will go into details for those that don’t know us or our work:
1) Technical contribution potential and focus on Cosmos SDK
Sentinel is involved in testing, revising, and building on the Cosmos SDK.
Game of Zones: Sentinel’s most recent performance in the Game of Zones showed the team’s competence with developing on Cosmos, especially when Sentinel’s custom relayer allowed the team to secure #1 position in round 2 of GOZ. To find out more about our custom solution and how we approached the competition please read:
IBC: Sentinel is currently undergoing a restructuring process and onboarding institutional support in order to have more resources to invest in our contribution to the official IBC relayer.
Sentinel network: Sentinel has also developed several modules allowing for developers to lock tokens for specific services (e.g locking tokens in escrow for distributed storage payments). In addition, the network is also planning to lead the construction of a Cosmos based bridge with the Handshake network allowing for interoperability between the two networks.
The Handshake network is focused on a ‘decentralized DNS’ system that is making tremendous strides towards a more decentralized and democratic internet, and the Handshake DDNS is also being integrated into Sentinel’s Cosmos-based dVPN client.
2) Unique protocol development for Cosmos ecosystem
Sentinel is also working on a ‘Proof-of-Bandwidth’ protocol based on Tendermint, that can be used by applications, within the Cosmos ecosystem, to effectively monitor and provide on-chain proofs of peer-to-peer bandwidth consumption, without the need to rely on any external 3rd party organization.
This protocol ensures that bandwidth providers and consumers can exchange data without misrepresentation of the actual ‘work’ completed. The protocol is complementary to distributed storage and distributed computing protocols, which also require bandwidth exchange for the movement of data.
3) Onboarding of enterprises and users onto Cosmos based dAPPs
There are tens of thousands of active users of the dVPNs built on the Sentinel network, with the network averaging over 5000 sessions per day and consistently exceeding 10000 sessions on many days. The live network statistics can be viewed here.
Although Sentinel’s initial dVPN infrastructure is built on the Ethereum chain, the beta Cosmos-based clients have already been released, and soon the entire dVPN infrastructure will be migrated onto the Cosmos-based dVPN clients.
As we partner with more organizations to build networking applications on the future Sentinel Cosmos based blockchain, and as the number of average daily users on the blockchain increases, Sentinel will be able to introduce the merits of the Cosmos network and the benefits it provides to enterprises and users all over the world!
Do you participate in governance? Give us some details about your approach to governance
We believe that being active in governance and voting on proposals is part of Sentinel’s responsibility as a Cosmos validator, and we take this responsibility seriously. The team participates in the community discussions, which usually revolve around proposals. We take into consideration the points raised by both the supporters and the opposers of the proposal that we’re voting on, before doing so.
While the upgrade proposals are generally much more prone to arrive at a fast consensus, proposals related to the use of the community pool require more of a due-diligence and unbiased analysis, which we don’t shy away from. In the future, the Sentinel validator will be utilizing forms of polling, in order to understand our delegator’s views on these sensitive governance proposals.
How have you contributed to the Cosmos ecosystem?
Sentinel’s tangible contributions to the Cosmos ecosystem to date include:
Testing and revisions of the Cosmos SDK:
1. Fixed an issue in the In IBC prototype which created problems with incorrect sequences in the process of relaying transactions between chains. https://github.com/cosmos/cosmos-sdk/pull/2896
2. Fixed an issue relating to queries where the data didn’t have proofs https://github.com/cosmos/cosmos-sdk/pull/3236
3. Fixed an issue that led to a block delay in querying the account, implemented a new query method to resolve the delay. https://github.com/cosmos/cosmos-sdk/pull/3767
4. Reported the wrong implementation of Private key and Public key interfaces and proposed the best method to implement. For the full description check https://github.com/tendermint/tendermint/issues/373
5. Requested and suggested a way to develop a solution to get the information (including time remaining) related to blocks that had yet to be synced. For the full description https://github.com/tendermint/tendermint/issues/3365
Efficiency related solutions derived from the GOZ Competition:
1) Phase 1 script
Phase 1 Script used for sending Client Updates to the Hub
- Throughout Phase1 we used our program to take care of the client updates on Hub
- It retires the same transaction 100 times (approximately 10 seconds) so there is a less probability of consuming more tokens for gas and a high probability of not making transactions in a short period of time.
- It updates both source and destination clients on both chains
- Easy to read and modify the code for those with programming knowledge
https://github.com/ironman0x7b2/goz-phase-1-updater
2) Phase 2 relayer
A modified relayer which allowed for the transfer of multiple packets within a single transaction at a very competitive throughput. The throughput (transactions/second) from the Sentinel custom relayer was the highest amongst all modified relayers in the competition.https://github.com/ironman0x7b2/goz-relayer/tree/modified
New Cosmos/Tendermint based modules:
1. Creation and implementation of a deposit module, custom-built to maintain status pertaining to the locking of tokens: https://github.com/sentinel-official/hub/tree/development/x/deposit
2. Implementation of a mechanism for locking and releasing tokens based on the application requirements, wherein in this case the user had to lock tokens in order to initiate a DVPN subscription.
This is the official repository of the Sentinel Hub. — sentinel-official/hubgithub.com
What should delegators expect from you as a staking partner?
1) Be highly involved in the governance of the Cosmos chain, by participating where relevant and necessary, fulfilling our responsibilities as Cosmos validators in ensuring a democratically robust environment.
2) Contributing to the Cosmos Ecosystem with our technical expertise, by not only, testing, revising, and contributing to the Core SDK, but also by developing proprietary protocols related to ‘Proof-of-Bandwidth’ resource consumption that can be utilized by other Zones in the ecosystem.
3) Expanding the Cosmos community and active users, by migrating tens of thousands of active users of the dVPN applications built on the Sentinel network to native Cosmos-based applications from the current Ethereum-based applications, and introducing these users to the merits of Cosmos.
So here you have it! One of the most hardworking and dedicated Cosmos validators! We understand that their current commission might make some of you reluctant to consider Sentinel for your redelegations, but we believe they are deserving of each and every %.
Sentinel always goes above and beyond the call of duty as a validator and their commitment and outstanding contributions alone show you their value as a staking partner!
We consider Sentinel a solid and reliable partner for any ATOM holder looking to delegate to a validator that will support the Cosmos network in fair and bad weather, sustain its growth, and ensure its success. So if you’re looking to diversify your delegations, we strongly encourage you to redelegate to Sentinel and join #TheAtomicSpreadOut!
You can connect with Sentinel here:
The Atomic Spread Out
The Cosmos Network is comprised of many hardworking people, all working together for the same goal. We want to give a stronger voice to those that make up our community and encourage delegators to reconsider their delegation strategy.
What can you do about it?
Wanna join #TheAtomSpreadOut ? Put your ATOMs to work and redelegate to smaller validators. It will help make the Hub more robust and will support hardworking validators that make the network a safe and reliable environment.
If you’re an ATOM holder consider diversifying your delegations to include smaller validators. In order to help you in this decision-making process, we will continue to showcase smaller validators that deserve your delegations.
We will be selecting validators with less than 1% voting power, that have never been slashed and maintain excellent uptime. #TheAtomicSpreadOut!
