Scalability has taken precedence above composability and transparency at StarkNet. However, it is currently striving to open source its technology.
Knowledge-Zero (ZK) Cairo 1.0, a new programming language compiler from rollup tech startup StarkWare, has been formally open sourced. Cairo 1.0 will soon be supported on Ethereum layer-2 scaling solution StarkNet in Q1 2023.
StarkWare, the organisation that runs StarkNet, revealed the information on November 25 via a tweet. With the help of recursive proofs and StarkWare’s roll-up technology, millions of L2 transactions might potentially be combined into a single Ethereum transaction. However, the project has come under fire for holding onto its intellectual property, not the least of which comes from its rival zkSync, a more open source-focused effort.
In its efforts to give its community and developers more power and ownership over its intellectual property, StarkWare referred to Cairo’s open-sourcing as a “milestone act.” Cairo is a programming language created primarily to take advantage of validity proofs and zk-Rollups.
As of today, Cairo 1.0 can be tested by programmers by compiling and running straightforward apps, according to StarkWare, until Q1 2023, when StarkNet will fully support it.
Abdelhamid Bakhta, a Starkware Exploration Lead and former Ethereum core developer, claims that Cairo 1.0 will thus allow for quicker feature development and increased community interaction.
According to StarkWare’s Medium article, Cairo 1.0 will enable blockchain developers to create and publish smart contracts to StarkNet once it is in production. Cairo 1.0’s “provability” of every computation, according to StarkWare, will boost StarkNet’s resistance to censorship and improve its ability to defend against denial-of-service attacks.
Numerous Web3 projects are powered on StarkWare’s STARK tech stack, including the nonfungible token (NFT) platform Immutable X, the decentralised exchange (DEX) platform dYdX, and the blockchain interoperability protocol Celer Network.
According to StarkWare’s Medium article, Cairo 1.0 will enable blockchain developers to create and publish smart contracts to StarkNet once it is in production.
By adopting Cairo to speed up its solution, which is not natively compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine, StarkNet has taken a risk (EVM). However, a transpiler called Warp that transforms Solidity code into Cairo code was created by Ethereum software tools company Nethermind. The EVM-compatible mainnet for rival zkSync is about to go live.
The announcement comes as Starkware also recently launched the new StarkNet currency (STRK) on Ethereum on November 17. This token will be used for staking, voting, and paying network fees.
