VBase

VBase Proposal Page Design

Introducing VBase: The Decentralized Proposal Review Submission & Storage Platform for the Interchain Validators

Validators play a pivotal role in maintaining the overall security and decentralization of a network. However, some of the tools available for the Interchain validators to upload and manage their data have been centralized, leaving them vulnerable to data loss and dependency on third-party systems. VBase will enable validators to upload & update their proposal reviews on chain with KYVE protocol, and manage the data in a decentralized manner.

On-Chain Proposal Reviews: Validators can share their vote decisions and reasons on chain, to help their delegators understand better about the context of the proposals and the reasons behind their votes.

Validators have long relied on centralized platforms to engage with their delegators. While these platforms offer convenience, they come with a significant drawback – centralization. When centralized platforms go down, the data stored on them can vanish, leaving validators without crucial information. Keplr Validator Dashboard/Wallet Dashboard have been a great governance tool for validators to cast their votes and provide reasons for their decisions with their delegators without using CLI, but there has been a lack of robust options for storing the proposal reviews on-chain in a decentralized manner.

VBase aims to solve the issue. It leverages the power of the Kyve protocol, a decentralized data validation and retrieval blockchain, to empower validators. With VBase, validators can easily publish and store their proposal reviews with Web3 storage providers and get the data validated by the KYVE validators. This ensures that their data remains permanent and immutable, even when centralized platforms experience downtime or disruptions.

What We Learned

Initially, we believed that KYVE could handle the validation and storage of any type of data. However, as we delved deeper into the protocol, we realized that it was better suited for specific data types, particularly those that are deterministic and retrievable from a DataSource using specific keys. Consequently, we had to let go of some of our initial ideas, such as creating a social reputation app based on an individual's GitHub contributions or developing an interface for validators to upload their logos onto the blockchain instead of using Keybase. This adjustment took a considerable amount of time, but it was indeed a meaningful and enjoyable process! It was fun to learn how to create a customized pool on KYVE and a pool validator as well.

Due to time constraints, there were certain features we were unable to implement:

Verifying whether the connected Keplr account has Authz vote permission from a validator. Validators typically avoid connecting their accounts to Keplr or other dApps for security reasons. It would have been preferable for them to grant Authz permission to a specific Keplr account via a CLI command, allowing them to use the account for voting and writing reviews within the VBase app.
Expanding support for additional blockchain networks.
Implementing pagination for the stored data to facilitate its usage.
Exploring additional use cases for the application, such as indexing and storing validator information that could be displayed on validator profiles.

Nevertheless, our primary goal was to build something for the Interchain validators on KYVE, and we are pleased that we were able to achieve this goal, albeit with some limitations.