Introducing the Hydro Community GitHub
Project Hydro is a decentralised blockchain product developed by fintech company Hydrogen. Consisting of five phases (Raindrop, Snowflake, Ice, Tide & Mist), the underlying protocols are open architecture; meaning that any developer can build their own dApp, or series of dApps, on top of the different protocols. To date, the majority of ideas and projects have come from Hydrogen, with just a few, such as a WordPress plugin, having been suggested and developed by community members.
The Hydro Twitter, Telegram, Reddit and Discord accounts are all very active and amazingly curated, with questions and answers coming from both the community and the core Hydro team. Mostly these cover the same general topics (partners, token dynamics, exchanges etc), but occasionally an interesting idea for a dApp based on the Hydrogen ecosystem will come from a community member. Sometimes these ideas turn into a brainstorming discussion among the community; or one of the the Hydrogen team will see the idea and direct the community member to Discord or GitHub, so that it can progress it to the Hydro Community Development Program (HCDP).
Once selected tasks are posted to the HCDP page by the Hydro team, developers can apply to develop them out and be rewarded in Hydro tokens. Managed by the core Hydro team, anybody can submit ideas to the HCDP for review and potential uptake as part of the program, however, not all of the ideas will be selected as an HCDP task.
It seems that more often than not, many of these ideas never get picked up, or make it to the HCDP page. It may be that the idea is too simple for inclusion on the HCDP and needs consideration and development before progressing to the HCDP. It may be that the user is too ‘overwhelmed’ by GitHub and all the talk of forks and pull requests. It may just be that the idea doesn't fit the fintech business model of Hydrogen*, but is nonetheless a valid use of the Hydro blockchain (Hydro Dating App anyone?).
*Because Hydro smart contracts offer decentralized functionality that is applicable beyond the scope of financial services, it is important to note that a wide range of non fintech applications can be built leveraging Hydro’s technology. While these projects aren’t the focus of the Hydrogen team that created Project Hydro, they are still viable opportunities for community members to expand the ecosystem.
In order to overcome some of these hurdles it was decided that a Hydro Community GitHub would be a useful tool and would, initially, serve four purposes.
- It would allow both developers and non-developers to suggest and brainstorm ideas for the HCDP (or the Hydro project in general), without them getting lost in the noise of Telegram, Discord, etc.
- It would prevent the HCDP from getting too clogged up with ideas, or tasks for phases of Hydro that are not yet ready for development, before being bumped up to the HCDP. This would also reduce admin work for the core Hydro team.
- It would be a place for the community to submit their marketing and design ideas.
- It may possibly allow the development of an ‘Unofficial HCDP’ where tasks outside of the HCDP could be posted, e.g. dating app, messenger, games.
If we can get more community involvement on GitHub, then we will have a place where ideas actually have the potential to transform into real world development products, and proof of concepts, for the Hydro ecosystem.
How to Comment on the Hydro Community GitHub
GitHub is an amazing tool for developers to work and interact, however for non-developers, all the talk of forks and pull requests can be a bit overwhelming if they just want to comment on a project or present an idea. In this post I will briefly explain how to join and comment on the Hydrogen Community Brainstorming GitHub page. It’s not difficult and would be a great benefit to the project.
First thing is to open a GitHub account. This is simple, visit https://github.com/, select a username, enter your email, and choose a password.
The next page asks you to choose your plan. Here you only need to check ‘Unlimited Public Repositories For Free’, and press continue.
Following this is a page asking you what your interests are. You can skip this at the bottom of the page and you will be taken to your own personal page.
Before we move on, you should set up 2FA. Sadly there is currently no Hydro Raindrop option, however if you select the drop down menu (circled in red in the image above) you can set up an alternative 2FA system of your choice.
Once you have this done and are logged in, you need to visit the Hydro Community GitHub account.
Click on the ‘Community Brainstorming’ repository and once there you will find a tab labelled ‘Issues’ (circled in red below), click this and you will be taken to the page where you can post a new comment/idea, or read and comment on previous ideas.
Commenting is straightforward, just click on the green ‘new issue’ button.
You then get two choices ‘Community Brainstorming’, which is for the discussions of HCDP ideas or ‘Suggestions’, which is for general suggestions for the Hydro Community.
Should you wish to edit you comment just click the three dots in the upper right of you comment and select edit. When you post anybody who is subscribed will get an email alert that a new post and/or comment is up.
That’s it, simple, welcome to the Hydro Community.
If you have any questions please ask in the Hydrogen Discord https://discord.gg/9GnbrZr
