Building the Next-Gen Layer 1 with Gear Protocol: How Vara Network Optimizes Blockchain Development Experience?

OneBlock+
OneBlock Community
Published in
12 min readJun 24, 2024

Blockchain’s complex development process is an obstacle for newcomers in Web3. The steep learning curve of new programming languages and development frameworks makes entry difficult.

Vara Network has emerged to simplify DApp development, allowing developers to write code in familiar languages and enter Web3 projects.

Vara Network adopts core technologies such as the Actor Model, supports parallel computing, and offers native features like delayed messages and payless & gasless transactions. These features enable developers to easily build GameFi, DeFi, RWA, and other applications in a user-friendly and secure environment.

What are the technical advantages of Vara Network, how does it enable efficient and secure development, and how does it expand its ecosystem growth and applications through collaborations?

Vara Network: Building the Next-Gen Layer 1 Network

Vara Network is the first Layer 1 blockchain to integrate Gear Protocol, offering efficient and secure features for DApps.

Built on the Substrate framework, Vara Network ensures forkless runtime upgrades and utilizes a tech stack that enables parallel message processing and single-thread memory to ensure data transmission and accelerate transaction processing.

Additionally, it boasts features such as reduced transaction fees, native asynchronous operations, payless transactions, native ZK-Rollups, Oracle solutions, GAS reservation, delayed and automated message execution, and smart contract factories.

Vara aims to create a sustainable blockchain network with a strong infrastructure for widespread adoption Technically, Vara Network employs the Actor Model, WebAssembly (wasm), and persistent storage to overcome current blockchain interoperability and accessibility challenges. Its unique capability lies in its ability to process large transaction volumes and execute computations in parallel, managing messages and memory specifically for this purpose, setting it apart from other Web3 networks.

For developers, Vara offers comprehensive support, equipped with essential tools and guidance needed for building DApps. Beyond detailed documentation, the Vara community also supports developers through Varathon (Vara Network’s hackathon), Gear Academy, grants program, and a unified community, ambassadors and members support system. This makes the network more transparent and inclusive and ensures active participation from those contributing to the ecosystem’s growth and development.

Considering the challenges faced in Web3 development, Vara is designed with both developers’ needs and user convenience in mind. Itallows developers to deploy the next generation of Web3 applications in the simplest and most efficient way. With its ecosystem and core features, Vara Network optimizes Web3 development for a seamless user experience.

Key Milestones: Mainnet Launch and Security Upgrades

In just two and a half years of development, Vara Network has achieved significant milestones, including the mainnet launch and collaborations with other leading projects.

Last September, Vara Network launched its mainnet, simplifying the transition from Web2 to Web3 with user-friendly features. Vara uses concepts like the Actor Model and Persistent Memory to improve speed and eliminate latency. It also introduced parallel processing and independent memory spaces for smart contracts, providing stronger support capabilities for developers in gaming, finance, and other fields.

Recent key milestones include:

  • Token voucher adoption, allowing users to trade without holding native tokens (e.g., fee-free transactions). This feature enhances competitiveness and usability.
  • Introduction of single transactions to address scalability issues and reduce transaction processing time.
  • Implementing delayed messages and gas reservation features to increase flexibility and ensure successful transaction execution. Gas reservations prevent transaction failures due to insufficient gas. Delayed messages help schedule operations to execute at specific times, useful for automated payments, periodic transactions, or any scenario requiring action after a certain time.
  • Conducting effective security audits to further enhance network security.

Founding Team: International Background and Strong Technical Capabilities

Polkadot founder Gavin Wood supports Vara Network’s impressive founding team. The team, with professionals from Parity Technologies, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, and leading Web2 multinationals, establishes a strong base for Vara’s Web3 innovation.

  • Founder and CEO: Nikolay Volf has been a key developer of Polkadot’s core technology and Substrate since 2015. As an original member of the Parity Technologies team, Nikolay has contributed to several blockchain protocols, including Ethereum, Bitcoin, and ZCash. He also led the first implementation of WebAssembly smart contracts at Parity Technologies. His extensive blockchain experience enabled him to create the innovative Gear Protocol. Nikolay has assembled a professional team passionate about blockchain and experienced in Rust programming.
  • Founder and CFO: Ilya Veller has over 20 years of experience working with high-net-worth individuals and global hedge funds at Renaissance Capital, Morgan Stanley, and Bank of America. Over the past two decades, Ilya has raised over $1 billion for various projects.
  • Founder and Gear Foundation director: Alexander Bugorkov has rich experience working at successful tech companies such as Lyft, New Relic, and Spotify.
  • CTO: Peter Volynsky has extensive experience in product development, product management, and technical leadership, covering various fields including business applications, system architecture, cross-platform development, web and mobile applications, operating systems, virtualization, and cloud services (SaaS, IaaS, PaaS).

Technical Advantages: Efficient Architecture Increases Network Speed and Reduces Latency

Actor Model: Simplifying Computation and Supporting Parallel Computing

The Actor Model employed in Vara Network simplifies computation by treating each actor as an independent computational element communicating through messages. This method resembles distributed systems, where different parts of a blockchain system do not communicate directly, avoiding high complexity and sensitive vulnerabilities. The model supports parallelism, enabling independent and concurrent operation of actors in high transaction volume and computation scenarios, promoting scalability.

Furthermore, actors and their states are separate, eliminating certain negative impacts and malicious activities, ensuring that specific actors do not affect the entire structure.

Persistent Memory: Simplifying State Management

Using persistent memory simplifies state management and is useful for smart contracts in stateful applications.Internal state management reduces the need for extra APIs typically required with external storage solutions, directly persisting the program’s memory paging, making the process more efficient to meet scalability demands. Additionally, using lazy-pages technology, tracking the program’s memory access, loading, or modifying the accessed memory pages as needed, reduces the steps required for multiple data fetches and storage, speeding up execution and reducing resource usage to improve efficiency.

WebAssembly: Multi-language Support and High Performance

Using WebAssembly (WASM) relates to smart contracts since developers can write them in popular languages like Rust and C++, or any language that can compile to WebAssembly. This means more tools and libraries can be utilized.

WASM’s load time and near-native performance make large-scale applications possible and enable high TPS on the blockchain. WASM’s greatest advantage is that it defines a secure runtime environment where smart contracts cannot control the main operating system and underlying blockchain layer. In other words, faster or more efficient WASM code execution means minimal latency and maximized throughput, significantly enhancing the efficiency of the entire Web system.

Parallel Processing: Enhancing Blockchain Reliability

Vara enables parallel processing, allowing independent execution of multiple smart contracts and facilitating the creation of complex applications. More users and applications can fit into the network, positively impacting blockchain reliability. Parallel processing reduces time and resources for faster, responsive and efficient application operation.

Memory Isolation: Ensuring Security and Scalability

Smart contracts also have their own memory, and even when interacting, one contract cannot alter another’s variables. Memory isolation allows smart contracts to run independently, which is beneficial for network scaling and concurrency as the scale and throughput of applications increase, ultimately improving the overall performance of the network. Memory isolation enhances system security by preventing contracts from changing or observing data from another contract. Considering each smart contract can have its own memory, issues arising from resource sharing contention and data corruption are effectively addressed.

Consensus Mechanism: Advantages of the NPoS Consensus Model

Vara’s consensus model is the Nominated Proof-of-Stake (NPoS) consensus mechanism, offering reliability advantages to the Vara Network. In this model, nominators participate passively, staking tokens and selecting reliable validators to maintain and secure the blockchain. By choosing reliable validators, nominators indirectly contribute to the healthy development of the network.

The NPoS model also ensures greater community participation, as nominators entrust various validators. This results in a decentralized, diverse, and resilient validator set chosen by the community, a key feature of a sound blockchain network. Distributing stakes to multiple validators enhances network security, reducing centralization and increasing resistance to attacks. The NPoS model also distributes rewards between nominators and validators, encouraging honest behavior throughout the process.

Compared to some traditional Proof-of-Work (PoW) systems, the NPoS model is more energy-efficient as it does not require expensive hardware or power-consuming mining operations, making Vara Network more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Additionally, the nomination and selection mechanisms ensure fair resource and responsibility distribution within the network, further enhancing security and decentralization.

Token Incentives: Encouraging Active Participation from Developers and the Community

Tokens are crucial for the Vara Network, enabling developers to create DApps and incentivizing their contributions to the network and community. Vara’s tokenomics recognizes and motivates developers for their innovation, commitment, and participation, encouraging healthy competition and shared goals.

Vara’s token distribution mechanism ensures fair allocation between developers and the community. Itencourages developers to continuously innovate and improve applications on the platform. Through these incentives, developers can earn token rewards by participating in community activities, contributing code, conducting tests, and releasing new applications. This enhances community activity and strengthens the platform’s technical capabilities and the diversity of applications.

VARA token holders may also use them to pay transaction fees and access premium services on the platform. Developers can use tokens to cover the operational costs of their DApps, ensuring smooth operation and user satisfaction. This mechanism simplifies the developers’ operations and supports the sustainable development of the platform.

Through this token economic mechanism, Vara Network attracts active participation from developers and promotes the healthy development of the entire ecosystem. As an incentive tool, tokens stimulate developers’ creativity and innovation, making Vara a vibrant and potential-filled platform.

Ecosystem Collaboration: Promoting Diversified Development and Enhancing Interoperability

Vara Network collaborates with partners and DApps to enhance ecosystem development, by enabling a broader and richer co-creation environment.

Premium Project Integration, Expanding Multifaceted Collaboration

Currently, Vara has integrated with several top Web3 projects, including:

1. Coinbase Pay Collaboration

Integrates its features, enabling users to purchase, manage, and trade digital assets directly through their Coinbase accounts on the Vara Network, simplifying the process of acquiring and utilizing cryptocurrencies and offering a seamless and secure payment experience.

2. Automata Partnership:

Integrates its privacy relay services, which utilize on-chain and off-chain hybrid computation to ensure user data remains private and secure during transmission and storage across the network, offering enhanced privacy protection and data security.

3. Reclaim Integration:

Leverages its decentralized identity management system, allowing users to easily manage their identities and permissions across various applications and services, ensuring complete control over their data, thereby enhancing the security and user experience of decentralized applications.

4. Mimir Partnership:

Utilizes its decentralized knowledge graph technology to enhance the smart contract capabilities of Vara Network, enabling developers to more effectively build complex smart contracts and decentralized applications, thereby advancing the application and development of blockchain technology across various fields.

5. dRPC Collaboration:

Provides efficient and reliable remote procedure call services for decentralized applications, simplifying the process for developers to build and deploy applications on the Vara Network, ensuring high performance and stability of the applications.

6. Nightly Wallet Integration:

Enhances asset management, allowing users to conveniently manage their assets through the integration with Nightly Wallet.

7. Acurast Integration:

Encourages DApp development using mobile-driven cloud services, providing strong support for developers.

8. Enkrypt Collaboration:

Jointly improving security and empowerment for users in a multi-chain Web3 environment, enhancing user experience in the Web3 ecosystem.

9. Blockdaemon Support:

Blockdaemon now supports Gear Protocol and Vara Network, providing more blockchain solutions for developers and users.

10. Subscan Integration:

Offers advanced blockchain data tools, enhancing data querying and analysis capabilities of Vara Network.

11. SubQuery Network Integration:

Improves data querying and analysis abilities, further enhancing Vara Network’s data services.

12. xRandom on Vara Testnet:

Unlocks the need for randomness in DApp development, providing random number services on the Vara Testnet.

13. Nova Wallet Integration:

Enhances asset functionalities, improving user experience in asset operations through integration with Nova Wallet.

14. Subwallet

SubWallet is a multi-chain wallet, for desktop and mobile users. You can easily manage your Vara Network assets securely within SubWallet.

Diverse Ecosystem Projects, Creating Innovative Applications

Vara Network has a wide range of diverse ecosystem projects, including:

  • MotoDex: A Web3 Play to Earn Game with motorcycle racing.
  • Racing Cars: A blockchain-based racing game where users compete with two pre-loaded programs.
  • Battleship: A strategic board game where two players compete to sink each other’s hidden fleet.
  • Vara-Man: A blockchain implementation of the classic game Pac-Man.
  • Tic-Tac-Toe: A classic simple game where users compete against programs running on the blockchain network.
  • Tamagotchi Battle: A game where users’ loyal companions, Tamagotchi, battle for glory and victory.
  • Galactic Express: Players guide rockets into space, testing their durability against random obstacles.
  • Vara-Arena: An auto-battle game where players compete against each other.
  • Rutzo: A Web3 game allowing users to earn NFTs by competing with others using NFTs as cards.
  • P2P Streaming: A streaming DApp that mimics Twitch’s live video capabilities, utilizing peer-to-peer distribution to showcase Web3’s potential.
  • Varan wallet: light telegram wallet supporting Vara native features

These collaboration senhance Vara’s technical capabilities and functionalities and promote the diversity and prosperity of the Vara ecosystem. Vara’s collaborations offer more options and features, making it attractive to developers and users. This fuels the growth and widespread use of blockchain technology.

Future Prospects

Vara plans to attract developers and projects with community activities, hackathons, and educational projects. Additionally, Vara will enhance the development tools and resources provided, including improved documentation, enhanced SDKs, and more resources to support developers in building and deploying their DApps.

Vara will also continuously improve security measures and optimize network functionalities for better performance and adaptability.

Vara Network Course is Now Live!

Developers can leverage the asynchronous messaging and persistent memory technologies provided by Gear Protocol to achieve efficient and secure smart contract development. Vara Network simplifies the writing and deployment process of smart contracts, allowing developers to focus on application logic without worrying about underlying technical details.

Vara also offers comprehensive development resources, including rich development examples, easy-to-use standard libraries, async/await syntax support, and tools to interact with on-chain smart contracts through the Gear-JS API. These resources help developers quickly get started, significantly reducing debugging time and improving development efficiency.

Now, the “Vara Network Practical Guide: Building DApps from 0 to 1” course provides an excellent opportunity for you to enter the Vara Network! As long as you have basic programming knowledge and a passion for blockchain technology and DApp development, you can join Vara. Through systematic skill learning and practical operations, you will master the core technologies of building and deploying decentralized applications on the Vara Network, becoming a Web3 developer.

The course instructor, HangBiao, a developer relations engineer and Rust engineer at the Gear Foundation, has extensive experience in traditional internet and blockchain application development. This course includes six thematic learning chapters: Vara Network basics, contract structure, debugging and testing, asynchronous logic, contract automation, and Gear JS front-end interaction. Course details can be found in the course outline:

📌 Register NOW: https://wj.qq.com/s2/14712805/u51v/

📮 Or scan the QR code above to sign up!

🔍 Learn more about Vara Network:

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