Golem GitHub Digest #6: SGX proof-of-concept for New Golem

What’s in store for this Digest?

For this Digest, we’re going to cover some recent team updates. We’ll also be going over development that the ExeUnits and R&D teams have been working on revolving around SGX support for New Golem. Other interesting news includes our team’s work on implementing Layer 2 payments on testnet.

Three weeks ago we released our Alpha reveal of New Golem running on the Rinkeby testnet. Our main objective was to have developers try out this release and collect feedback from potential users. While most of this information will be used internally, our community wanted to know what devs were thinking, so you can find a summary here.

Before we delve into the Digest, we’d like to remind you that our Community Incentives Program is ongoing (check this Community Update for the list of August winners). In case you’re on that list, please reach out to us on Twitter or send an email to contact@golem.network saying it’s you and we will provide you with instructions to receive your GNT reward.

So, what’s in the Golem GitHub?

The Golem team has been researching and developing SGX for about three years or so. Now with New Golem naturally, we want to include SGX support which will allow features for establishing a trusted execution environment (TEE) on an untrusted host platform. Since Golem is decentralized and anonymous, features such as SGX can have a significant benefit for users.

Team members from the R&D and ExeUnits teams have been collaborating to work on a proof-of-concept for SGX support. The Yagna Rust API (yarapi) repository will be used for the team to test the newly-developed SGX computation flow.

On the payment side of things, recently we announced that we’re going to implement zkSync as a possible Layer 2 payments option to tackle both gas prices and also allow for much faster payments.

Last week, the payments team merged a pull request adding the minimal zksync driver meaning the basic functionality of Layer 2 payments are possible on New Golem which we’re very excited about! If you watch the testnet token (NGNT) closely you might even be able to spot some of the tests of Layer 2 payments happening using Etherscan.

Digest wrap-up!

If you happen to be a developer then we would love for you to check out our handbook for getting started quickly with the alpha of New Golem! Come chat with us about it in our community Discord if you’re keen to learn more about it. And don’t forget that the CIP is running and we’re always on the lookout for community members participating anywhere the Golem community exists (Reddit, Discord, Telegram, etc.). See you in the next GitHub Digest!