The development history of the consensus mechanism and the Glow consensus
1. Why a consensus mechanism is needed: Maintain consistency
As a distributed ledger, the blockchain means that every node can verify transactions, and of course the object should be a consistent ledger, so as not to cause conflicts between each other. The consensus mechanism is to solve this “ Consistency” issue.
In the blockchain, the transactions that occur at each node will be recorded in this ledger in the form of packaging the new account records into a block, which is time-stamped, encrypted, and will be appended to the latest After the block, a chain data structure is formed.
Such a data ledger itself does not provide decentralization. Only by adding a decentralized consensus mechanism can this system be decentralized. To put it simply, in this ledger, who will keep the accounts becomes a problem, and the distribution of the right to keep accounts should be decentralized. The consensus mechanism emerged to solve this problem of accounting rights.
In short, the consensus mechanism is a question of group decision-making: how a group of people make a decision that is most beneficial to everyone, and this decision must be fair to everyone.
2. The development of consensus mechanism PoW-PoS-DPoS
In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto proposed Bitcoin and blockchain in the paper “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System”, in which PoW was applied to Bitcoin to solve the problem of who is the most. However, people quickly discovered the problem of this consensus mechanism, that is, it consumes a lot of energy and is controlled by a large mining pool, which will still cause the problem of centralization.
In 2011, a digital currency enthusiast named Quantum Mechanic proposed a Proof-of-Stake (POS) proof mechanism on the Bitcointalk forum. The mechanism was fully discussed and proved to be feasible. POW is to compete against computing power, and POS simply means to compete against who has more coins. The more coins in the hand, the higher the probability of obtaining the qualification for bookkeeping.
In August 2013, BM’s Bitshares project was launched, and it brought a new consensus mechanism: Delegated Proof-Of-Stake (DPoS), which is the certificate of share authorization. It is a bit like the representative system of modern countries, but it is not how many representative seats are allocated to each constituency. Instead, nodes holding a certain number of tokens are used as candidates, and then all nodes are voted for, and the top 101 votes are elected as representatives. These representatives are responsible for generating blocks. Representatives take turns to generate blocks, and the revenue (transaction fee) is equally divided. If a representative does not produce the block honestly, it is easy to be discovered by other representatives and shareholders, and he will be kicked out of the “board of directors” immediately, and the vacant position will be automatically filled by the representative with the 102nd vote.
From POW 、POS to DPOS, it can be said that it is a main line of the development of public chain consensus mechanism. These three consensus mechanisms have their own advantages and disadvantages. For example, POW has complete mathematical proofs. It is the safest in theory and relatively simple to implement. However, it has great shortcomings in energy consumption, block time, and transaction capacity, while POS has Security risks are greater, network traffic pressure is high when nodes are elected, and “the rich get richer, the poor get poorer” and other issues. DPOS reduces the number of election nodes and reduces network pressure, but its degree of decentralization is questionable.
3. Glow consensus integrates three consensus mechanisms to break the impossible triangle of security, decentralization, and performance that cannot be met at the same time
UltronGlow’s consensus GLOW is divided into three parts: Proof of Stake Consensus (PoS), Proof of Storage Resource Consensus (PoSR) and Proof of Effective Storage Consensus (PoTS).
PoS (Proof of Stake)
The consensus proof of block generation on the chain is to select Ultron nodes from all candidate nodes based on a specific algorithm to complete transaction accounting and block generation work and obtain PoS rewards.
PoSR (Proof of Storage Resources)
Anyone who provides storage resources to support the public chain system combined with VFS technology will allocate PoSR rewards based on the storage resources of the entire network.
PoTS (Proof of Traded Storage)
Combining the support of storage resources and the work proof mechanism based on dynamic and effective storage (application services), it can complete off-chain services to effectively store digitalization as proof of work on the chain and off-chain interoperability. When any storage resource is used or leased, the service provider will be rewarded.
Based on the above consensus design architecture, GLOW improves the availability of the UltronGlow network for nodes and users, and also ensures the operability of on-chain and off-chain connections, and can maintain the long-term health of the entire network.