Neptune Documentation

The documentation for Neptune is distributed across the following categories.

Consensus

Neptune achieves succinctness by requiring STARK proofs to certify most of the consensus-critical logic. As a consequence, verifying and even running a full node is cheap. The tradeoff is that someone has to produce these STARK proofs, and this burden ultimately falls most heavily on the miner (for aggregated block transactions) and to a lesser extent on the sender (for individual transactions).

The particular proof system that Neptune uses is Triton VM. The particular computations that are proven (and verified) as part of consensus logic are documented here.

Consensus is the feature of a network whose nodes overwhelmingly agree on the current contents of a database, typically a blockchain. This database is append-only. While reorganizations can happen they are expected to be rare and shallow. Every once in a while, a new block is added. The block body contains a single transaction that aggregates together all inputs and outputs of individual user transactions since the previous block. Blocks and Transactions are the key data objects that consensus pertains to. The consensus logic determines which blocks and transactions are valid and confirmable.

Note that there is a distinction between valid and confirmable. Validity refers to the internal consistency of a data object. Confirmable refers to its current relation to the rest of the blockchain. For example, having insufficient proof-of-work or including a double-spending transaction makes a block invalid. But a block can be both valid and unconfirmable, for instance if its timestamp is too far into the future. STARK proofs are capable of establishing validity but not confirmability.

Since both blocks and transactions come with STARK proofs certifying their validity, it is worthwhile to separate the kernel from the proof. The kernel is the actual payload data that appears on the blockchain, and the object that the proof asserts validity of. There can be different proofs certifying the validity of a block or transaction kernel. Proofs can typically be recursed away so that the marginal cost of storing them is zero.

Neptune-Core

Neptune-Core is the name for Neptune's canonical client software. It denotes the binary/executable that runs a node on the Neptune network.

Triton VM

Neptune achieves succinctness by requiring STARK proofs to certify most of the consensus-critical logic. As a consequence, verifying and even running a full node is cheap. The tradeoff is that someone has to produce these STARK proofs, and this burden ultimately falls on the miner.

The particular proof system that Neptune uses is Triton VM. Triton VM is a standalone project and comes with its own documentation

Contributing

Instructions and helpful information for people who want to contribute.