0. What is Solana and how does it work?

Solana is a high-speed blockchain built for decentralized apps and crypto. Its main strength is handling thousands of transactions per second due to several key features:

• Proof of History (PoH): A method that timestamps transactions in order, making validation faster and more efficient.

• Sealevel Parallel Processing: Unlike other blockchains, Solana can process multiple transactions at once, boosting performance.

• Gulf Stream: This reduces confirmation times by optimizing transaction forwarding and eliminating unnecessary data.

• Turbine: Solana breaks data into smaller parts, speeding up how information moves across the network.

Together, these features make Solana fast, scalable, and low-cost, perfect for decentralized apps.

1. What is Solayer?

Solayer is a decentralized infrastructure layer built on top of Solana that introduces the concept of restaking to optimize resource allocation across the network.

Many people say Solayer is the EigenLayer on Solana, but it is not. Solayer is a completely new architecture, in a sense, a restandardized restaking in the Solana ecosystem. Solayer is more focused on optimizing Solana’s transaction prioritization and network bandwidth.

For an ordinary user, Solayer is a platform that helps you earn rewards by restaking your SOL tokens on decentralized applications (dApps) built on Solana. It simplifies the staking process, allowing users to participate in securing apps and improving their performance without having to manage complex validator setups. Essentially, you stake your tokens and benefit from improved services on Solana’s dApps while earning extra rewards.

For the Solana network, Solayer enhances network performance and security by creating a marketplace for stakers, validators, and developers. It helps applications get better access to blockspace (the capacity to process transactions) and ensures stake-weighted Quality of Service (swQoS)—meaning the more SOL tokens are staked, the better performance those apps can achieve. This adds a layer of efficiency and prioritization to the Solana ecosystem, improving its scalability and throughput.

Here's a quick breakdown:

1. Restaking: Users who stake SOL (Solana’s native token) to secure the network can restake these tokens to support decentralized applications (dApps) or external systems. This additional staking increases security and improves access to blockspace and transaction prioritization for dApps.

2. Stake-weighted Quality of Service (swQoS): Solayer uses swQoS to allocate network resources (like blockspace and transaction processing capacity). The more SOL tokens an application or validator stakes, the higher their transaction priority and overall performance.

3. Restaking Marketplace: Solayer connects restakers (who supply tokens), validators (who secure the network), and dApps (that require blockspace). This creates an efficient marketplace where resources are balanced based on supply and demand, ensuring smoother transactions.

4. sSOL (Liquid Restaking Token): Users receive sSOL when they restake their SOL tokens. This token is liquid and represents the restaked SOL, which can be further traded or delegated within the Solayer system.

This system helps applications access resources more efficiently, while users can participate in securing the network and earn rewards in return.

3. Did you play with cars as a kid? Let’s break down the car analogy for Solayer!

Think of it like renting extra cloud storage or processing power: applications with more restaked SOL get better performance. Stakers provide the stake (supply), dApps demand the blockspace (demand), and validators facilitate the process, ensuring the network runs smoothly.

Solayer functions like a system that coordinates three critical components: restakers (who provide the stake, like toll-payers), applications (the "cars" using the blockspace), and validators (the "highways" that ensure transactions are processed efficiently). Just as toll roads prioritize vehicles that pay, Solayer gives applications with more restaked tokens better access to network resources, improving their transaction performance. This setup creates a balanced marketplace where everyone plays a role in ensuring smooth traffic on the network.

4. What is Solayer - Metrics?

Starting point: May 16, 2024, launch of Epoch 0

295k unique wallets have made deposits

Total Value Locked (TVL) of $245 million

X | Discord | GitHub | YouTube | Linkedin