9

dApps / Web3 - Help me finally understand / ELI5!

 3 years ago
source link: https://dev.to/inhuofficial/dapps-web3-help-me-finally-understand-eli5-4dc3
Go to the source link to view the article. You can view the picture content, updated content and better typesetting reading experience. If the link is broken, please click the button below to view the snapshot at that time.
neoserver,ios ssh client
Cover image for dApps / Web3 - Help me finally understand / ELI5!

dApps / Web3 - Help me finally understand / ELI5!

OK so I have read a few things about blockchain and dApps, I have listened to a few Twitter spaces and tried to educate myself on this.

But I am still not seeing the actual big picture, rather than a hype train and I want to understand it finally!

Crypto currencies make sense, NFTs kind of make sense (although the current "NFT points at a URL to prove ownership" model is flimsy at best) but dApps...they make no sense to me!

How do you get minimal latency lookups (like how does DNS work on such a complex network).

Why is it beneficial to have a distributed network where you don't control when the core "operating system" software updates and may be running different versions on different nodes.

How do you roll back a major mistake that exposes user data (for example) fast enough to avoid problems? And on the same track, if a node gets compromised in some way, who is responsible for the breach (my understanding is limited so this might be unlikely, I don't know!)

How is it better when it will inevitably result in more jumps and hops to data nodes, which won't be as efficient as large data centres and therefore use more energy.

Updating 10,000+ different data nodes rather than 6/7 CDNs seems like it is going to exponentially multiply data transmission data costs and energy costs.

All of these questions assume that "Gas prices" drop to next to nothing and it becomes commercially viable of course, which at the moment it certainly isn't.

Please, I may sound cynical, I am not really, I just don't see the Web3 benefits as clearly as everyone else apparently does!

Also if my terminology is crap, apologies, ask me if something doesn't make sense!

Discussion (4)

pic

CollapseExpand

I'm on the same page, I don't get it. Even though I've worked with, or around, blockchain and cryptos for 5 years I still don't get the point of dApps.

I liked the point in energy consumption, though I don't know if it will be that much more (I haven't researched that at all). Another interesting point is that the development process for dApps is quite crap (at least the last time I tried it), they are more complex than regular apps, they're slow and kinda complex to maintain.

Little side story, I worked in a dApp a few years back. I was in charge of creating the POC for a decentralized social network, which is still alive. My initial implementation was a desktop app (we wanted it to be as decentralized as possible) and was run on a custom fork of bitcoin at the time (bad idea as transactions could not store more than 1kb of data if I recall correctly). We later switched to some other custom blockchain fork to support more data, but that's another story. It took me around 3 months to get the POC working, and after that, I dropped from the project as I did not enjoy the process whatsoever, and other people hopped in.

After working on that for some time, they realized that the desktop app was not ideal as updating it was not that easy, it was not practical and people would rather not download an app. So they decided to make it a website, somewhat centralizing it and returning to what we wanted to avoid. What I'm trying to get to is, that in theory, dApps sound great, but at some point, they must be somewhat centralized to make it more practical, easier for users, and for the developers to manage the app.

I haven't been following this stuff for a couple of years, so things might've changed since then, please correct me if that's the case.

Hope that makes some sense, I don't like talking about this as I have a bit of PTSD from my time working on that app xD

Comment button Reply

CollapseExpand

Author

•

Nov 4

Interesting to have this perspective on it! It worries me even more that someone who has given it a "proper go" found it so difficult, but I do believe it is evolving quickly so would hopefully be easier now.

It is the fundamentals part that I can't get, you mentioned the updating and maintaining...that I cannot see improving to Enterprise levels purely down to logistics of shifting data around and having any chance of keeping it under control.

Hopefully someone will come along and give us both an "A-Ha" moment and encourage you to push past your awful experience and give it another go!

Comment button Reply

CollapseExpand

Yeah I too hope it has evolved a bit since then. And hopefully, as you say, someone will clear some things up for us.

I also can't see it at an enterprise level any time soon, but maybe they're not ment to be. I also doubt big companies would want to, having control over the system and having access to data is quite powerfull for them.

Comment button Reply

CollapseExpand

Author

•

Nov 4

WHo knows, by the end of today I might actually understand it all and get involved!

Both side or the argument are welcomed as long as they are civil! ❤

Comment button Reply


report

Recommend

About Joyk


Aggregate valuable and interesting links.
Joyk means Joy of geeK