Solana is a blockchain with support for smart contracts, one of the main competitors of Ethereum. Launched in March 2020. For the summer of 2022, it ranks second in terms of the number of decentralized applications (dapps) launched on it and is in the top ten in terms of capitalization on Coinmarketcap. The emission of the base SOL coin occurs through staking. The maximum number of coins is not limited.
Solana has a two-level consensus based on the original Proof-of-History (PoH) algorithm using timestamps, providing state finalization. At the base level of the blockchain, a kind of delegated Proof-of-Stake is used with elected validators, but their number is actually unlimited. The hardware requirements for running a validator node are quite high: at least 12 processor cores and 128 GB of RAM are recommended. At the same time, the minimum deposit in SOL is not limited. The average profitability of staking on the Solana blockchain (not on pools and exchanges) is about 6-7% per annum in SOL.
Solana can run almost the same types of decentralized applications and tokens as Ethereum and other similar blockchains, including DEX and NFT. The development of smart contracts is not tied to one built-in programming language. It is possible to use such popular languages as C++ and Rust.
The Solana development team is partially decentralized, but Solana Labs is mainly responsible for the operation of the blockchain. The main developer and founder of the project is Alexander Yakovenko, who lives in California, USA.
The developers of Solana claim a throughput of several thousand transactions per second, but a significant part of it is occupied by “technical” transactions that are not created by users. At the same time, transaction fees are significantly lower compared to the main blockchains based on PoW and some based on PoS.
Over the years 2021-2022, the Solana blockchain experienced several times of overload and software errors, as a result of which the confirmation of transactions stopped or significantly slowed down for several hours. In June 2022, the developers reported that one of the bugs that caused these crashes was resolved, but it may take many more months to fully resolve all stability and performance issues.
The community criticizes the “excessive” support and promotion of Solana by the founder of the FTX exchange, Sam Bankman-Freed. Solana also has legal problems. So, on July 1, 2022, a class action lawsuit was filed against Solana in the United States. A group of investors accuse Solana Labs and Anatoly Yakovenko of unregistered sale of securities and attempts to manipulate the value of the SOL coin.
Source: Bits
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