April was an incredibly busy period at Stratis. With the continued development and testing of the Sidechain Masternodes being undertaken, there was a lot of preparation that went into exhibiting at the London Global Expo.

Development Update

During April it was agreed that we would bring the Sidechain codebase into the Full Node. This allowed development to progress whilst ensuring overall stability through the host of tests that are in place. A total of 76 commits were made to the codebase during April, this consisted of changes being made to over 350 files with 8,911 additions of code.
The development on the Full Node primarily focused on the Sidechains Masternode codebase, with the upcoming release both the development and testing teams have made significant progress in ensuring the Sidechain Masternodes are ready for release as soon as possible.
A summary of key developments during the month of April can be found below:

• • Enhanced shutdown sequence
  • Increased verbosity of Smart Contract logging
  • Experimentation of various database technologies to offer alternative storage options for clients
  • Enhanced throughput of cross-chain transfers
  • Stabilisation of the federation wallet and cross-chain transfers by achieving deterministic transaction creation
  • Improvements to transaction lookup performance

Utilization of the Stratis Coherence Suite across the development team is something that has been key during April. Testing the blockchain should never be limited to the validation of agreed node communication protocol. In the Stratis network there are two officially supported types of node implementations which behave slightly differently. This all makes low-level testing a crucial part of the overall delivery.
Stratis has extended the Wireshark Bitcoin Protocol Dissector to match changes introduced to Stratis Protocol on the top of original Bitcoin implementation. Stratis Protocol dissector is one of the primary tools we use when analysing and diagnosing issues between nodes at a network level.

The essence of the blockchain is the transactions which make up blocks. Since the transactions are represented as binary data in a HEX notation it would be very difficult to work with them in that format. The Stratis Transaction Builder is a tool that is used to provide a meaningful view of the individual blockchain transactions as well as help us create non-standard transactions.
The interface maps the parts of the transaction HEX to the decoded value so that when the transaction is edited using one of the human readable values the HEX code updates automatically.

Stratis impressed the crowds at “Blockchain Expo – Global” in London

2019 is all about acquiring enterprise customers for Stratis. After two years in development, all key modules of the Stratis platform went live in 2018, so the London edition of the Blockchain Expo global series of events was a great opportunity for Stratis to raise their profile on 25th/26th April.
Many visitors told us our stand was the best at the show. As a Platinum Sponsor of the event, Stratis was there in force, both on the booth and in the conference tracks.
Stratis subject matter experts, Paul Farrington and Rowan de Haas, presented “DLT for the Enterprise” and “Smart Contracts as Rules for Money – a Case Study” to packed arenas.

Rowan’s talk showcased work he recently led to put trade payments in the Construction Industry on the Stratis blockchain for Wildara, an Australian project management consultancy. The project demonstrated that the Stratis blockchain can automate Supply Chain payments as soon as deliveries for cement or any other project activities have been completed, removing administration, speeding the process and ensuring regulatory compliance for the parties involved.
The other item premiered by Stratis at the show was the Stratis Coherence Suite of testbed tools. As Stratis CEO, Chris Trew, observed:

When we developed the Stratis Platform we also built a testing suite optimized for blockchain, enabling us to move fast and provide transparency – we quickly realized this is something everyone building a blockchain network will need and the Stratis Coherence Suite was born.

The suite provides a set of viewers that can be dragged and dropped to provide real-time insight into areas such as network topography, chain status and node statistics, along with a set of transaction tools to create test data and aid investigation.
The Stratis team welcomed a continuous stream of visitors to the stand during both days of the expo, including many large enterprises interested in the value blockchain can bring to their businesses. Badges were scanned and every one of them has been followed up, with many conversations already in progress and meetings scheduled over the coming weeks. Based on the success in London, the team is already targeting a major event later in the year to take the Stratis experience to one of the other key regions of the world.
There was also additional collateral created for Stratis as a result of the London Expo, this included product specific leaflets, a promotional video and a number of giveaways to people visiting the stand. The promotional video can be found below, as well as all other collateral showcased at the expo.

Presentations

Rowan DeHaas – Stratis Smart Contracts as Rules for Money
Paul Farrington – Stratis DLT for the Enterprise

Leaflets

Stratis C# Full Node
Stratis Coherence Suite
Stratis DLT
Stratis ICO Platform
Stratis Smart Contracts in C#
Stratis Use Case – Gluon
Stratis Use Case – MediConnect
Stratis Use Case – Wildara

This is the first of our monthly updates and will provide an overview of the development and testing progress at Stratis.

Full Node Development

The Full Node has seen a vast amount of enhancements over the last month, primarily focusing on stability. The most notable developments can be found below.

• Substantial enhancements to bandwidth consumption
• Spamming and denial-of-service attack tolerance has been greatly improved
• Various improvements to combat syncing edge-case scenarios
• Node fault reporting improvements
• API can now be accessed on start-up
• Improvements to our unit and integration test suite (of over 2600 tests)
• Improved wallet balance reporting
• Various connectivity updates to the node’s API and RPC method implementations

Sidechain Development

With the recent announcement of the Cirrus Masternodes, development has primarily focused on stability and user experience. Highlights of the development can be found below.

• Improved testing of sidechain components
• Refactoring of federation withdrawals
• Re-design of leader selection functionality
• Integration of latest Proof-of-Authority design

Smart Contracts Development

Smart Contracts development has continued since the production release. A highlight of the most recent items can be found below.

• Optimal repository structure defined
• Enhancements to Smart Contracts testing tool “MockChain” resulting in improved test stability
• Improved user-experience via API documentation and returned messages in HTTP responses
• Ability to verify contracts on a network
• Network parameter adjustments to account for upcoming Sidechain Masternodes joining the network

Testing

The experience of the team at Stratis has resulted in the development of a suite of internal testing tools to assist with the functional testing of our products. These tools enable Stratis to push our products outside of normal use-cases, instilling confidence in stability and responsiveness.
The Stratis Full Node has been extensively tested, utilizing the internally developed NetworkViewer.

The NetworkViewer constantly monitors all nodes via API and RPC calls, TCP dumps, log hooks and produces statistics and charts at a per node level.
This rigorous test process ensures nodes can perform all basic network operations i.e. IBD, synchronization, transaction propagation, mining, fork recovery, etc. In addition, the environment is subjected to adverse network conditions not typically experienced on the mainchain i.e. broadcasting large number of transactions, long multichain reorg, etc.

Cirrus Sidechain Masternodes Applications

An application form to register interest in operating a Masternode on the Cirrus Sidechain whilst continuing to earn staking rewards from the Stratis Mainchain was announced. More information regarding how you can register can be found below.

Stratis Sidechain Application

James DeGale Sponsorship

Stratis had the pleasure of sponsoring former Two-Time IBF World Super-Middleweight Champion, James DeGale in his highly anticipated bout with Chris Eubank Jr.

Stratis Brand Awareness

Our partner, MediConnect have received a significant amount of mainstream media attention with the announcement of their blockchain solution utilizing the Stratis Platform. This has seen Stratis mentioned in prime-time slots on TalkSport, the world’s biggest sports radio station and publications in major tabloids, including The Sun and The Mirror.
The MediConnect ICO Public Sale begun on the 20th February and will run through until 15th May. You can register to take part in the MediConnect ICO using the below link.
https://ico.mediconnect.io

Stratis is excited to announce that we are now a certified Microsoft Partner. Our mission is to get C# blockchain technologies in front of enterprise customers, and we look forward to utilizing the marketing and development resources Microsoft provides to its certified partners. The Azure Marketplace gives app and service providers access to 120,000 enterprise customers and 800,000 ecosystem partners in 190 countries. Microsoft actively helps to guide customers to their partners, and partners are given resources which allow them to increase their product’s exposure on Microsoft’s Go-To-Market Services.

With over 1 million active users, the marketplace generates over 100,000 leads to partners every month – Microsoft ISV Program

This partnership comes at a critical and also exciting time for Stratis; the services which constitute the core Stratis Platform, including smart contracts, sidechains, and the enterprise-focused Stratis DLT, are set to be released in the next few months. Stratis Group Ltd. are the first blockchain company with their own cryptocurrency to partner with Microsoft in this way, and this partnership will help us make the most of our unique position within Microsoft’s software environment. We also think of this step as just the first step in enhancing our existing relationship with Microsoft, and we aim to become a Gold Partner in the near future!

This partnership gets me very excited indeed. I am looking forward to working with Microsoft’s Go-To-Market Team and further leveraging the Azure technology stack with the Stratis Platform. – Chris Trew

The accreditation is indicative of the relationship that Stratis has with the .NET Framework, a software framework developed by Microsoft. Stratis is the first and only cryptocurrency with full nodes built from the ground up in C# meaning that applications built using the Stratis Platform are a part of the .NET ecosystem. This partnership is a natural next step for Stratis.