This article is based on various articles and summarized in my own way.
***CONTENTS.
StarkNet Overview
How StarkNet Works
The StarkNet Ecosystem
The Future of StarkNet***
StarkNet is a permissionless, decentralized ZK-Rollup running as an L2 network on the Ethereum chain. The project continues to be developed and new features are implemented on a daily basis. StarkNet is currently led by StarkWare. Currently, the ecosystem is growing and various projects are being built on StarkNet. In addition to that, it has recently become possible to bridge ETH/DAI from L1 to StarkNet.
Comparison of starkware and zksyncEthereum has long faced challenges implementing scaling solutions. After years of research and development, Ethereum's developer community has moved to a rollup-centric roadmap.
However, not all rollups are the same. Today, we will discuss zkRollups.
Two of the leading teams competing in the zkRollup space are Matter Labs and Starkware, with Matter Labs offering zkSync 1 and 2 and StarkWare offering StarkEx and StarkNet.
What is StarkEx? StarkEx is a zkRollup from StarkWare launched in June 2020 that supports generic smart contracts (generic here means that the smart contract has the ability to execute arbitrary logic). The application is deployed on StarkEx. Applications can be deployed on StarkEx to provide a user experience similar to or better than Ethereum while leveraging the scalability of zkRollup.
To date, StarkEx has processed 42 million transactions and $18.5 billion in cumulative volume across the four protocols it hosts (dYdX, ImmutableX, DeversiFi, and Sorare).
StarkNet has a sequencer, a proofer, and a verifier, a participant in the network. Off-chain, the certifier then creates a STARK proof, a type of zero-knowledge proof, and notifies the verifier, which maintains the network state, to update it to the new state.
StarkNet is still in the development stage, and there are not many well-known projects running on StarkNet. However, in April 2022, Maker DAO, an autonomous decentralized organization that pioneered the DeFi project and issues the stablecoin Dai, announced the use of StarkNet as part of its multi-chaining efforts.
Snapshot, a decentralized voting system that is being used in DAOs, is developing an on-chain version of Snapshot X on StarkNet.
Meanwhile, some projects are leaving StarkNet. The decentralized exchange dYdX, currently using StarkEx for V3, has announced plans to leave Ethereum and StarkEx for full decentralization and scaling for V4, and to launch its own blockchain on Cosmos.
StarkNet will allow permissionless sequencers and certifiers to join the network while aiming to reduce costs and improve TPS, and will create the first decentralized version by the end of 2022.
While the number of projects using StarkNet is limited and TVL is not yet large, StarkWare is a proven startup and received a massive $100 million investment in May 2022, just as the cryptocurrency market was beginning to look like it was entering a winter period.
The cryptocurrency winter period will see a steady stream of development in projects that will carry the next season, and StarkNet could be one of them.
