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Incognito Software Stack

It could be a little overwhelming to read the Incognito source code. There are more than 1 million lines of code in the Incognito codebase. This topic provides an overview of the Incognito architecture and a guide to navigating the Incognito source code.

Network Architecture​

The Incognito software stack is designed in five layers.

  1. The P2P Networking layer implements on top of libp2p [Benet and Dias, 2019] to handle peer-to-peer communications such as finding peers, connecting to them, sending and receiving transactions, blocks, and messages.

  2. The Blockchain layer, or the Data layer, implements data storage for shards and beacon and data synchronization among nodes.

  3. The Core layer implements the consensus mechanism, privacy, and bridges to other cryptonetworks.

  4. The Developer Tools layer provides a few different options for developers to work with Incognito, including an SDK, RPC, and Websocket.

  5. The Application layer ships a reference mobile wallet, some reference privacy apps, and a reference hardware full node.

We also built several infrastructure tools to support network monitoring, visualization, and deployment.

Figure 1. The layered Incognito architecture.

We implemented Incognito in Go [Go, 2019] for a balance of portability, performance, and the development efficiency it brings to a large-scale, open-source project like Incognito.

  • P2P Networking
    • Peer Management. Peer management handles peer-to-peer communications such as finding peers, connecting to them, sending and receiving transactions, blocks, and messages. Its code is in the connmanager package and the addrmanager package.
    • NetSync. NetSync is a mediator that receives incoming messages, parses them, and routes the messages to the right components. Its code is in netsync package.
    • Highway. Highway is a new network topology design that speeds up P2P communications. It is under development under the highway branch and will be merged into the master branch in November 2019.
  • Blockchain
    • Shards. Shards are subchains. A subchain is a Proof-of-Stake blockchain with its own committee of N nodes. A shard's job is to produce new blocks via a Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance (pBFT) consensus algorithm. Its code is in the blockchain package.
    • Beacon . Beacon is also a subchain. A beacon's job is to coordinate the shards and maintain the global state of the network. Its code is in the blockchain package.
    • Synker. Synker makes sure the node is up to date among its peers and also broadcasts the node status to its peers. Its code is in the blockchain package.
    • Mempool . Mempool (memory pool) is a collection of transactions and blocks that have been verified but are not yet confirmed. Its code is in the mempool package.
    • Wallet. Software that holds all your Incognito keys. Use it to send and receive your Incognito tokens. Its code is in the wallet package.
    • Database . Incognito uses LevelDB to store block data. Its code is in the database package.
  • Core
    • Consensus
      • pBFT . For consensus algorithm, Incognito implements pBFT (Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance). Its code is in the blsbft package.
      • BLS . For multi-signature agregation, Incognito implements BLS Multi-Signatures. Its code is in the blsmultisig package.
      • RNG . For random number generator, Incognito currently uses Bitcoin block hash. We'll explore other RNG solutions in the future. Its code is in the btc package.
    • Privacy
      • RingCT. For privacy, Incognito implements RingCT (Ring Confidential Transaction) with ring signatures, stealth addresses, and confidential transactions. Its code is in the privacy package.
      • Confidential Asset . RingCT hides the amount of the transaction, but it doesn't hide the type of asset being sent. Confidential Asset solves that. It's under development under the new-privacy-dev branch and will be merged into the master branch in December 2019.
      • Mobile ZKP. Incognito implements Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKP) Generation on mobile. Private transactions can be sent on any regular phone under 15 seconds. Its code is in the wasm package and the zeroknowledge package.
    • Bridges
      • Ethereum. Incognito implements a trustless two-way bridge between Incognito and Ethereum to let anyone send and receive ETH & ERC20 privately. Its code is in the bridge-eth repository.
      • Bitcoin. Incognito is working on a trustless two-way bridge between Incognito and Bitcoin to let anyone send and receive BTC privately. Estimated ship date: Dec 2019.
      • Cosmos . Incognito is exploring Cosmos and hops to build on a trustless two-way bridge between Incognito and Cosmos. Estimated ship date: March 2020.
  • Developer Tools
    • RPC . RPC lets developers interact with Incognito via your own programs. Its code is in the rpcserver package.
    • WebSocket . WebSocket is another way for developers to interact with Incognito via your own programs. Its code is in the rpcserver package.
    • SDK. Incognito is working on Developer SDKs to make it even easier to build on top of Incognito. Estimated ship date: Nov 2019.
  • Apps
    • Mobile Apps. It's easy to build your own mobile apps on top of Incognito, once the SDK is available. Here is an example: Mobile Wallet.
    • Web Apps. It's easy to build your web apps on top of Incognito, once the SDK is available. Here are some examples: Web Wallet or a Desktop Network Monitor.
    • Hardware Devices. It's easy to build your own hardware on top of Incognito, once the SDK is available. Here is an example: Node Device.