Holochain Monthly Review

Author: Holochain

Compiled by: ChainCatcher

Welcome to our monthly roundup ------ January edition, where I bring you this month's exclusive news as always. If you have been following our regular updates shared on Telegram or Twitter, you might already know that we now have a usable Elemental Chat application, and we are working hard to prepare the Holochain and Holo infrastructure so that we can release it to all hosts. We're almost there!

If you want to know what we've been up to with Holo and Holochain over the past month ------ the wait is over! Let's dive right in.

The first Dev Pulse of the new year will be a brief one. This is not because nothing has happened ------ in fact, part of the reason is that a lot has happened, and I need to go back and handle it. Holochain RSM is growing, and now is the time for both seasoned and new developers to start building on it. (This means new developer documentation is on the way!)

Read Holochain Dev Pulse 88 --- New Year, New Energy

The focus over the past few weeks has been testing Holochain by testing Elemental Chat on HoloPorts. We have narrowed down the performance degradation, and we are doubling down on making Holochain run well in these scenarios.

I also have a ton of news prepared for developers ------ tools, promises of tools, and significant changes in Holochain that should make your life a bit easier.

Read Holochain Dev Pulse 89 --- Test, Test, Test (and some good stuff for developers)

Yes, you read that right! We are actually ahead of our expectations in some areas. While it will take some time to complete the infrastructure testing, as it is one of the most complex aspects of our work, we have been able to advance many other activities. Therefore, we decided to move the HoloFuel application up in the roadmap. Here’s what the new changes look like. Check it out on our website, where you will find more details.

While there aren't many code examples in the guide, it does point out the ways we have been able to learn over the past few years. We have been able to leverage Rust for the SDK in a better way, which means application developers can reduce their code by 50-60% and write more ergonomic code in the process. We have also utilized advancements in concurrency libraries within the Rust ecosystem to eliminate deadlocks and race conditions, generally making this crazy distributed computing more efficient.

Thus, the migration guide + HDK documentation (unfortunately not available online) and the new holochain codebase may be of interest to other RiB developers and worth exploring. Check out the evolving migration guide from Redux to RSM.

If you are curious about hot topics from news development updates, you can find them on Twitter.

A series focused on providing simple hApp development solutions for real humans. Low Code Zone explores the possibilities of combining agent-centric solutions with simple modular tools that make building applications as easy as configuring a website. Watch the first episode:

Build It! is a brief live walkthrough on how to quickly develop working applications on Holochain using scaffolding and rapid application development tools.

The next Live AMA will be held on February 9, 2021, at 8 AM UTC --- submit your technical questions here with Phil EP 6.

The ecosystem meetings are long-term dialogues with long-standing Holochain application builders about progress, beliefs, and the ins and outs of building distributed solutions and organizations around them.

RiB Newsletter #20 --- Old School Cool

We will co-host a track at this year's FOSDEM conference. The track is called Beyond Blockchain --- Distributed Web. FOSDEM 2021 is entirely online and completely free, so we encourage you to attend and invite your developer friends to join us.

Holochain staff will hold some talks and workshops focused on helping developers understand Holochain and start hApp development. Hope to see you there!

Here’s what you will find inside:

Read the latest issue of Holo Today.

We held AMA 44 in December, and you can watch the replay here. Get a sneak peek of Elemental Chat.

We want to hear your questions for the next AMA, so keep them coming!

The biggest and most important event this month is the release of Holochain RSM ------ a better, faster, and stronger new Holochain. Now it's time to hear what developers have to say!

Join the RSM technical discussion on the Holochain forum for detailed information about the various features of the new Holochain and how to migrate your hApp. Find the playlist here.

Watch clips from the AMA directly on YouTube! Check out the growing playlist here.

Our community and events team are tirelessly working to bring people together to create amazing things on Holochain. As always, we thank all the community organizers, without whom this magic would not be possible! Many events are held virtually to respect #SocialDistancing, so nothing is stopping you from participating!

Interested in building hApps? Join the Holochain forum and start your journey!

Check out our upcoming events section and participate. Everyone is welcome!

As always, if you have general questions about Holo, Holochain, or HoloPorts ------ or want to join our enthusiastic community ------ the best starting point is our Twitter and Holochain forum.

If you have specific questions about Holo or HoloPorts or any technical inquiries, you can read more or contact us directly at https://help.holo.host.

We hope you enjoy this month's brief news roundup, and we'll see you next month --- Paulii @ Holo