#PI# Soroban smart contracts and pi network

Stellar Network introduced Soroban smart contract functionality in Protocol 20 in 2024. In other words, the Pi Network testnet has been upgraded to Stellar Protocol 22, enabling Pi Network to support smart contract operations.

In the subsequent protocol upgrades, the Stellar Network not only continues to enhance protocol stability and TPS (transactions per second), but also significantly improves the execution performance of smart contracts in complex scenarios. At the same time, Stellar has achieved forward-looking designs in state storage management, including state leasing mechanisms, data compression, and historical archiving. These initiatives make it a leader in addressing state bloat compared to most public chains, including Solana.

Currently, due to the influence of the Meme coin craze, Solana is facing a situation of explosive growth in state. Although the network can cope in the short term, its long-term sustainability will be threatened if mechanisms such as state rent or data compression are lacking—node operating costs may become unaffordable, leading to network centralization and performance degradation.

Through continuous optimization of the Stellar Network protocol, Pi Network has become one of the most powerful public chains. From the perspective of fundamental design and long-term sustainability, the protocol evolution of the Stellar Network provides a solid foundation for the development of Pi Network. The direction and potential demonstrated by Pi indicate that it has the potential to become one of the most competitive public chains in the future.

————————————————————

Today, I would like to highlight Soroban.

You may have recently heard the name "Soroban" because it is also the name of a smart contract platform on the Stellar blockchain network.

· Stellar's Soroban: This is a platform designed for developers to build and deploy smart contracts and decentralized applications (dApps) on the Stellar blockchain. Its name is inspired by the Japanese abacus.

· Naming implication: Just like the ancient abacus is an efficient, reliable, and precise calculating tool, Stellar hopes that its smart contract platform can also possess these characteristics—efficient, secure, predictable, becoming a "reliable tool" for building financial applications.

1. When and in what agreement was Soroban introduced to Stellar?

Soroban is a smart contract platform introduced on the Stellar protocol. Its introduction is not a single point in time, but rather a phased rollout process.

· Official announcement and testnet launch (2021-2022): Soroban was first officially announced at the Stellar Meridian conference in October 2021. Subsequently, the first developer-focused Soroban testnet went live in February 2022, allowing developers to test and build smart contracts in a real network environment.

· Mainnet launch in phases (2024): After more than two years of testing, auditing, and iteration, the final version of Soroban is released alongside Stellar Core v20.0.0. It was activated on January 30, 2024, through the Stellar mainnet protocol upgrade 20.

· It is important to note that the initial activation is a "phased rollout". This means that the smart contract functionality is first enabled in the "mainnet preview" mode, where the execution of contracts does not consume network resources (such as bandwidth and storage) for final stress testing and ecosystem preparation.

On September 9, 2024, with the upgrade of Protocol 21, Soroban's fee mechanism will be fully activated, marking its complete integration into the Stellar mainnet and entering a production-ready state.

Summary: Soroban was introduced on the Stellar protocol, and its mainnet version is officially deployed through the upgrades of Protocol 20 and Protocol 21 in 2024. Soroban was introduced on the Stellar protocol, and its mainnet version is officially deployed through the upgrades of Protocol 20 and Protocol 21 in 2024.

---

2. What functions does Soroban have?

Soroban brings powerful programmability to the Stellar network, with its functionality designed to overcome some common issues of traditional blockchain smart contracts (such as high fees, low throughput, and uncertainty). Its main functions and features include:

Core Functions:

1. Turing-complete smart contracts:

· Allows developers to build complex decentralized applications (dApps) on Stellar, such as automated market makers (AMM), lending protocols, NFT marketplaces, custom token standards, etc.

· Use Rust and WebAssembly (WASM) as the core development environment. WASM provides high performance, predictable resource consumption, and a good developer experience.

2. Scalability and High Performance:

· Predictive Resource Pricing Model: Soroban pre-calculates the required resources (CPU, memory, storage, etc.) before executing contracts and charges fees based on estimates. This avoids high costs and uncertainties caused by auction-style gas fees like those on Ethereum.

· Horizontal Scaling: Through its design, Soroban validator nodes can process transactions in parallel by adding more servers, thereby theoretically achieving horizontal scaling of the network and increasing overall throughput (TPS).

3. Seamless integration with the existing Stellar ecosystem:

· Native asset support: Soroban smart contracts can directly interact with Stellar's native assets (such as Lumens - XLM) and all tokens issued on the Stellar chain (such as USDC) without the need for "wrapping" or "bridging."

· Shared global state: Contracts can coexist and interact with classic Stellar operations such as payments and order books. A transaction can simultaneously include classic operations and smart contract calls.

4. Developer Friendly:

· Familiar toolchain: Based on Rust/WASM, it has attracted a large number of existing Web2 and Web3 developers.

· Powerful SDK and Local Environment: Provides the soroban-cli command line tool and Stellar FutureNet (a test network that simulates the mainnet environment), making it convenient for developers to test and deploy contracts.

5. Security:

Using the Rust language itself can avoid many memory safety vulnerabilities.

· The contract runs in a sandbox environment, isolated from the node's core processes, enhancing the security of the network.

· Underwent multiple audits by top security firms before going live on the mainnet.

Design goals and problems to be solved:

· Lowering the barrier: By offering predictable low fees, both developers and users can utilize smart contract features at a lower cost.

· Enterprise-grade applications: The design for high performance and scalability is aimed at meeting the needs of enterprises for blockchain technology, supporting high-frequency commercial applications.

· Empowering Financial Inclusion: Continuing the mission of the Stellar network, providing more complex financial tools and services through smart contracts to further promote financial inclusion.

Brief Summary:

Soroban is a smart contract platform officially introduced to the Stellar network in 2024 through a protocol upgrade, centered around Rust and WebAssembly. It aims to bring high performance, scalability, low cost, and security to programmability for Stellar, enabling developers to build complex dApps while seamlessly integrating with Stellar's fast and low-cost payment network, collectively advancing its vision of financial inclusion.

———————————————————

Summary:

1. Soroban was introduced on the Stellar protocol, with its mainnet version officially deployed in 2024 through Protocol 20 and Protocol 21 upgrades.

2. The Pi Network is built on the Stellar Protocol, and currently, the Pi Network Testnet 1 has been upgraded to Protocol V22. In the coming weeks, Testnet 2 and the Mainnet will steadily upgrade to Protocol V23.

After the PI Network upgrades to Protocol 23, it will fully provide smart contract capabilities through Soroban!

3. The introduction of Soroban in the Stellar protocol has been completed through gradual review, iteration, and testing. This indicates that the current Soroban smart contract platform is secure, stable, mature, efficient, has low fees, and scalability, making it more suitable for developers to build ecosystems.

Re-emphasize the advantages of the Soroban smart contract platform

Stellar brings high performance, scalability, low cost, and security to programmability, enabling developers to build complex dApps while seamlessly integrating with Stellar's fast and low-cost payment network, together advancing its vision of financial inclusivity.

4. The power of the Pi Network lies not only in its own innovation but also in the first principles, the perfect design and integration that everything can be utilized by me. A universal, inclusive, fair digital token economy platform supported by the cryptocurrency Pi.