Technical Progress of the BTC Ecosystem: Overview of Programmability Solutions

Since the first quarter of 2024, although the speculative enthusiasm for the Bitcoin ecosystem has waned, significant progress has been made on the technical front, especially in the area of programmability expansion solutions. This article will introduce several noteworthy BTC programmability expansion solutions, including Fractal Bitcoin, AVM, OP_NET, BRC100, and programmable runes, among others.

Fractal Bitcoin

Fractal is a scalable framework based on the Bitcoin core client software virtualization, which improves the overall network performance by recursively creating a tree structure. It is fully compatible with Bitcoin and its infrastructure, while activating the op_cat operator for more logic.

Fractal is developed by the Unisat team and has currently completed its Beta testnet, with the mainnet expected to launch in September 2024. In its tokenomics design, 50% is generated from mining, 15% is allocated for the ecosystem, 5% is pre-sold to early investors, 20% is distributed to advisors and core contributors, and 10% is set aside as community subsidies.

In terms of architecture design, Fractal encapsulates the Bitcoin core client as a deployable blockchain package through virtualization technology, and runs multiple instances on the Bitcoin mainnet through recursive anchoring. It makes some modifications to the Bitcoin core, such as shortening block confirmation time and increasing block size, to enhance performance.

Fractal activated the op_cat operator, providing more possibilities for scalability solutions on BTC. In terms of cross-chain asset transfer, seamless transfers can be achieved between different instances through a universal asset transfer interface.

To enhance security, Fractal has introduced a joint mining mechanism and allows newly created instance chains to set a protection period during the startup phase. In the future, large miners can allocate their computing power to different instances, further improving the robustness of the system.

AVM

AVM( Atomicals Virtual Machine ) is the BTC smart contract implementation of the Atomicals Protocol. It creates a virtual machine that simulates BTC scripts and opens up multiple raw BTC opcodes, allowing developers to implement smart contracts through Bitcoin script combinations.

AVM maximizes the capabilities of BTC's original opcodes and achieves Turing completeness through a dual-stack PDA. It includes the complete BTC opcodes, allowing developers to program many BTC features that are not enabled on the mainnet.

As a framework, the AVM is applicable to almost any metadata protocol with just minor adjustments to the indexer beneath the virtual machine. The AVM has currently released a test version, and the relevant code has been open-sourced on GitHub.

OP_NET

OP_NET aims to introduce Ethereum-like smart contract functionality to the Bitcoin network, but more in line with the characteristics and architecture of Bitcoin. Users can trade on OP_NET using only native BTC, without the need for other tokens to pay fees.

OP_NET provides a complete, compact, and easy-to-use development library, mainly written in AssemblyScript. It retains Bitcoin's block consensus and data availability, by executing complex calculations on Bitcoin blocks through the virtual machine (OP_VM).

OP_NET supports multiple programming languages and enables advanced smart contract features using Tapscript. The smart contract code is compressed and written into BTC transactions, generating a UTXO address that is regarded as a contract address.

The OP_NET ecosystem covers multiple areas such as decentralized trading, lending, market making, liquidity provision, and cross-chain bridges, including several projects like Motoswap, Stash, Ordinal Novus, and Ichigai.

BRC100

BRC-100 is a decentralized computing protocol built on the Ordinals theory, enabling complex DeFi operations by adding new actions such as "burn" and "mint" to brc20. It provides operations like mint2/mint3 and burn2/burn3, allowing tokens to be securely converted between the UTXO model and the state machine model.

The BRC-100 protocol and its extension protocols constitute the BRC-100 protocol stack, with all extension protocols being mutually compatible. Currently, there are extensions such as the BRC-101( on-chain governance protocol ), the BRC-102( automated liquidity protocol ), and the BRC-104( liquidity staking/re-staking pool protocol ).

The main projects in the BRC-100 ecosystem include inBRC(, the first BRC-100 marketplace and indexer ), 100Swap(, an AMM DEX) based on the BRC-102 protocol, and 100Layer(, a liquidity protocol ) on Bitcoin L1.

Programmability Runes ( Protorunes )

Programmable runes are an extension layer of runes that allow for the creation of programmable assets with runes. The Proto-Runes Protocol is the main project that provides a framework for programmable runes, supporting DEX functionalities similar to Uniswap on the Bitcoin network.

The key mechanisms of Proto-Runes include Protoburn( converting runes into a form usable by sub-protocols) and Protomessage( executing operational instructions in the sub-protocol). The indexer first processes the Runestone features in the rune protocol, and then sequentially processes the protocol messages of the sub-protocol.

Recently, the first Protorune "QUORUM•GENESIS•PROTORUNE" has successfully completed Protoburn, demonstrating the correct operation of the ord indexer. This genesis Protorune is intended to serve as a public forum for Protorune standards and can provide governance functions for project tokens.

Overall, these programmability extension solutions bring more possibilities to the Bitcoin ecosystem, promoting the development of BTC in the areas of smart contracts and decentralized applications. With the maturation and application of these technologies, the Bitcoin ecosystem is expected to usher in a richer and more diverse future.