Pre Labweek 2023 SMS Roadmap & Outcomes

Pre-LabWeek23 Roadmap to coordinate work between Spark, Meridian, & Station.

Work tracking happens here: SMS GitHub Project

Overview

Station is a project within the @@Anonymous group at Protocol Labs (@@Anonymous group); the Retrieval Markets team’s goal is to enable performant retrieval of data within the Filecoin network. The Station project has a broader ambition to unlock latent hardware capacity and lower the barriers for participation in distributed economies. Two major work streams that are integral to the success of Station are Spark and Meridian:

  • Station is a deployment target (hardware and client layer) for lightweight, incentivized participation of Station Nodes running Station Modules that put a computer’s idle resources to work in the Filecoin network (e.g. can be run on a personal laptop and receive rewards)
    • Station introduced the Zinnia runtime, on which Spark also runs
  • Spark is a SP (storage provider) Retrieval Checker module and the first Station module.
  • Meridian is an impact evaluator implementation framework for creating on-chain incentives (i.e. reward payments) in off-chain, distributed networks. The Spark implementation of Meridian is the first implementation.

[wip] Visualization of project relationships:

Critical cross-project dependencies

  • SPARK
    • Station / Zinnia is able to run all modules
    • “Measure” service integrates with Meridian contracts
    • “Evaluate” fraud detection service integrates with Meridian contracts
  • Meridian
    • Station / Zinnia is able to run all modules (linkage to API service?)
    • Meridian supports Spark’s use case out of the box
    • Meridian supports Saturn to a basic level
    • Integration with existing reward function modules on Station
    • Reward round service integrates with Reward contract

⚛️ LabWeek Priorities & Goals

📍 LabWeek23 in Istanbul:

🔀 For outcomes separated by project, see Appendix 1

Priorities:

P0: Near-term, LabWeek - The Spark Meridian implementation launches incentivized retrieval checking that increases the # of Spark nodes by an order of magnitude, facilitating a substantial growth in performance in Filecoin’s retrieval capabilities,

  • Metrics:
    • # active station modules running Spark:
      • Disaggregated: # downloads vs. online nodes vs. active nodes
    • # completed retrievals w/ Spark check
    • % of jobs identified as fraud/collusion
    • Monthly Churn

P1: Longer term - Create an ecosystem of Station modules that perform valuable, incentivized jobs in the Filecoin network

  • Meridian unblocks the creation of new Station modules by providing a robust framework for deploying onchain impact evaluators

Goals:

  • 500+ new Station nodes are brought online during LabWeek
  • 50,000 retrieval jobs are completed before 24Q2 (within 4 months after launch)
  • < __% of jobs identified as fraud/collusion
  • 1-2 new Station Modules in development backlog

🛣️ Pre-LabWeek Product Roadmap

Note: Consolidated from SPARK and Meridian docs

M0: pm/dev - SMS Roadmap Released

  • Consolidated roadmap for Spark/Station/Meridian is iterated & agreed upon by team ✅
  • Roadmap (milestones, issues, etc.) transition into GitHub Project as source of truth ✅
  • Outreach to schedule user interviews ✅
  • Outreach to contractors (audit/dev) and Subvisual ✅
  • Spark has greater clarity on incremental milestones and their ~associated fraud risk/attack vectors, allowing for an estimation of capabilities by LabWeek ✅

M1: pm/dev - Meridian Designs Complete, Spark Version Update Fix, Websites Scoped

  • Meridian contract design frozen 🥶 for v0 ✅
  • Ship SPARK autoupdate improvement, enabling faster deployment in the future [Roadmap link] ✅
  • (Internal) Website updates and designs have been scoped for Station / Spark / Meridian ✅
  • Meridian integrates reward function ✅

M1.5: FIL Dev Summit Iceland

  • Meridian & SPARK Presentations ✅

M2: dev - Meridian Smart Contracts available for Beta Group Builders

  • All Meridian v0 smart contracts are complete
  • New Meridian contracts have been audited 🚧

M3: dev SPARK Tasking: PoC Released

  • Introduce the concept of a SPARK round that’s tied to Meridian round.
  • Rework SPARK Orchestrator and Station module to use these new rounds.
  • Plug into MERidian M&E services to reject measurements for tasks that are not part of the SPARK round.
  • End to end integration of Meridian contracts with Spark M&E services

M4: dev SPARK Proof of Data Possession: CAR checksums

  • Enhance SPARK to compute checksums of retrieved CAR files and verify these checksums during fraud detection.

M5: dev - SPARK Beta launch

  • Initial soft-launch of full network with Station nodes running Spark Meridian implementation to send rewards to f1 or t1 wallets
  • Create simple dashboard for tracking metrics

M6: pm Ready for Public launch of Meridian, Spark, Station

  • All websites are live, including meridian framework website and (light) docs, the Station website is updated to reference SPARK / Meridian, and Spark roadmap or docs have been published
  • Station app updated
  • Presentations for LabWeek drafted: Re-launch of Station, Spark announcement, & Meridian framework announcement
  • SPARK has a public post-LabWeek roadmap
  • Messaging, marketing, outreach & $wag

M7: dev - SPARK CID Sampling: PoC Released

Appendix 1

LabWeek2023 separated by project:

🛰️ Station:

Priorities:

  • P1: Station desktop app is ready for nodes to earn FIL.
  • P2: Website updates have been made in preparation for broader announcement of Station
  • P3: Presentation made on the future of Station and the next modules planned beyond Spark (proof of compute?)

Metrics:

  • # active station modules running Spark:
    • # downloads vs. active nodes vs. incentivized
  • # of jobs completed (retrievals w/ Spark module)

Goals:

  • 500+ new Station nodes are brought online during LabWeek
  • 50,000 retrieval jobs are completed before 24Q2 (within 4 months after launch)
  • 1-2 new Station Modules in development backlog

💥 Spark

Priorities:

  • P1: Spark module is sending simple measurements into the Spark implementation of Meridian, enabling FIL payouts to Station nodes (in small amounts to start beginning with a <1000 FIL pool)
  • P2: Spark has a clear roadmap for continued incremental improvements and an accompanying commitment from LT of associated FIL pools (by milestone).
  • P3: Presentation given on Spark and its critical function for retrieval incentives and the future of Filecoin.

Metrics:

  • # of jobs completed (retrievals w/ Spark module)
  • % of jobs identified as fraud/collusion

Goals:

  • Broader awareness of Spark and its role in retrieval incentives program.

🌐 Meridian:

Priorities:

  • P1: Contracts are complete & audited for Meridian framework, enabling payments to Station nodes
  • P2: Website & docs are complete
  • P3: Presentation on Meridian framework, its use in Spark/Station, and potential future use cases

Metrics:

  • # of unique payments
  • (?) # forks of the GitHub repo

Goals:

  • Meridian unblocks the creation of new Station modules and other onchain IE implementations by providing a robust framework for deployment
  • Internally, the team has mapped out next use cases of Meridian (product work, led Corey & Matt)