INTRODUCTION

The lecture delivered by professor @pelon53 on the Hashgraph technology was enlightening, personally, I did not realize that the blockchain had a competitor, which might even be the future of the decentralized consensus and transaction system.

He defined and explained the concept of the hashgraph, and stated it's characteristics together with it's pros and cons, which gave us a slight idea of the comparisons between the Hashgraph and the Blockchain system.

Now let us get into answering the questions given to us in the homework section, which will help us throw more light on the modus operandi of the hashgraph technology.

QUESTION 1

Explain in detail the Gossip protocol, used in Hashgraph.

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The Hashgraph technology is a technology with very high scalability, higher than that of the Blockchain because of the processes it makes transaction information go through before being verified, which are mainly processes in the gossip protocol.

When talking about the blockchain, we look at it's scalability, security, and efficiency, as we know, the blockchain has different consensus algorithms with which it works.

So what is the gossip protocol?. how does it make the Hashgraph so efficient and secure?

The Hashgraph Technology has it's nodes in a different arrangement from the Blockchain, when sending details about a transaction to it's nodes, it is like there is a gossip network established.

where each node relays all the information it has acquired at the moment to another node, which continues to do the same to another, which passes it unto another. Making it seem like the Hashgraph technology ensures that there are no secrets whatsoever between the nodes with the use of the Gossip protocol.

Let's take a more practical example, let us say that we are in a huge room filled with buyers and sellers, and let's give each seller a unique number, like sellers 1, 2,3, and so on. Now when seller 1 makes a transaction with seller 2, he tells seller 2 all about it, who then transfers the same information (gossip) to seller 3 whenever she has a business or a transaction to complete with seller 3.

Note that seller 2, if she had already done other transactions with other sellers, would not hide the information of the transactions of other sellers when relaying the Seller 1 & 2 information. So in other words, all the transaction history of every single seller in the room is known by every seller. This method is called the "gossip about gossip", it's like relaying former news of other transaction details to other nodes.

More importantly, to also know, the gossip protocol spreads the news of transactions like Wildfire, imagine each node whispering details of a new transaction made by a node to each other in a random non synchronized way.

As seller 1 is done with a transaction, she tells seller 2, who goes on to tell seller 3, but at the same time, seller 1 is still spreading the news to other random sellers in the room, or network.

This is how the other sellers also when they get news of a new transaction spread the news to each other randomly, until each seller, or node in this case knows all the details of the transaction.

Now we regard the transaction details or information as "Hashgraphs" and whenever the hashgraph passed from one node to another is the same, it is regarded as "Gossip Synchronization". Each node that has established a Gossip synchronization, establishes together another term in the technology known as an "event".

It is through the creation of events that hashgraphs are stored, and they are made with certain components that make it up. Every event is made up of:

• TIME STAMP:
  As the name suggests, the time stamp is the time it took to make a gossip sync, But the one mostly used in the hashes in general is the Consensus time samp. It shows the time it took the nodes in the hashgraph network to all receive information about a transaction. It is usually calculated as the median of all the time it took each node to get that information, and sums it up to form the "consensus Time Stamp" which all the nodes then generate, forsaking their individual times of receiving the information.

• TWO HASHES OF EVENTS UNDER IT:

1. Self parent hash:
   The self hash is the hash of the event that is being created at the moment.

2. Other- Parent hash:
   The other parent hash is the hash of an old transaction, which the nodes are transferring to each other also through this event.

• TRANSACTION:
  This is the record of the transaction that is being processed and broadcasted throughout the network.

• DIGITAL SIGNATURE:
  For every secure transaction, there should be the presence of a unique signature to verify the authenticity of that transaction.

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The above picture illustrates the actual hierarchy of the information that makes up an event, and you can see all the components formerly described above to be part of the illustration.

Now that we understand the basics about the Gossip protocol, and also learnt about the gossip about gossip, and all the components that make up an event, let's move on to the next question.

QUESTION 2

Explain Tolerance to Byzantine Faults in Hashgraph.

We understand that the Hashgrap network is decentralized and that it makes use of nodes, and passes information from node to node. Now to answer this question, I'd like to first explain what Byzantine fault tolerance is, before moving on to explain how the hashgraph inculcates Asynchronous tolerance for byzantine faults.

WHAT IS BYZANTINE FAULT TOLERANCE (BFT)

The Byzantine fault concept came from the days of wars, where commanders in different sides of a unitd country needed to relay information to themselves, but as they were in faraway districts within that country, they had to use messengers, which brought up the problem or fault in communication.

This seems to occur within decentralized networks too, assuming we take the different commanders as nodes, we'd be able to understand why the problem will arise. What if there is a sabotage node, that is not relaying the correct information? how does the network tolerate this?.

We know that the nodes on the Hashgraph have to come to agreements on things like the timestamps, and the transaction verification. So for an agreement to happen, there has to be an agreement or consensus on what these decisions would be, sometimes.

Sometimes there are compromised nodes, which will not be honest about transactions, but BFT still ensures that the general consensus is the correct one, as all the nodes in a decentralized system can not be compromised all at once by the same malware or hacker. This is the power of the Byzantine Fault Tolerance(BFT), to be able to tolerate the decision of compromised nodes in the network.

EXPLANATION OF THE ASYNCHRONOUS BYZANTINE FAULT TOLERANCE USED IN HASHGRAPH

The "Asynchronous" Byzantine Fault Tolerance is different from the regular BFT in the sense that the message timing is taken into consideration. It eliminates the assumption of BFT's limit of message development.

The Asynchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerance allows the elimination and loss of some entries by nodes, and takes on the assumption that delaying and eliminating some messages would reduce the presence of compromised messages, letting more of the right messages come through.

The ABFT will reach a consensus with this method as long as less than 30% of the nodes are not compromised, using the hindering and elimination method.

With this method, the Hashgraph system can come to a correct consensus by an assumption that it has eliminated more malicious or wrong messages than it has eliminated the right ones, resulting in a transparent result.

So with these, decisions like the correct consensus timestamp to use and the transactions to verify are decided, and this ABFT yields practically transparent results in real life.

QUESTION 3

Make a comparison between Hashgraph Vs Blockchain, for a voting process in your country. Which technology would you choose? Why?

I would like to compare the Blockchain and the Hedera Hashgraph in a tabular form first, to simply layout the main and proper differences between the two, before properly discussing them each.

BLOCKCHAIN	HEDERA HASHGRAPH
Uses different consensus algorithms like the Proof of Work, Proof of stake, and so on to achieve network consensus	Uses virtual voting of nodes to achieve network consensus
Depending on the consensus used, transactions are as fast as 100-100,000 per second	The transaction per second rate is estimated to be about 500,000 transactions per second
Some coincidental blocks might be discarded from time to time	There is no waste of resources as every transaction and event is saved.
Blockchain is open-sourced	Hashgraph is patented or proprietary
Blockchain is a proven decentralized system	Hedera hashgraph's decentralization is still theoretical and has not been proven

• CONSENSUS ALGORITHM USED:

The blockchain uses various consensus like the proof of work, which majors mostly on the work of each node, or the Proof of Stake or even the Proof of burn, to accomplish network consensus.

But the Hedera Hashgraph uses virtual voting by the nodes, similar to the byzantine voting system to achieve a consensus within the network.

• SPEED:

As we all might know, the speed of blockchain depends on the consensus algorithm we are talking about, as consensus and transaction verification speed all depends on the nodes. However, the range of transactions per second (TPS) for the blockchain is about 100-100,000 TPS.

The Hashgraph is almost 5 times faster as it does not need to verify the nodes as the blockchain does, it conducts a vote between already verified nodes.

• EFFICIENCY:

The blockchain sometimes has a case or two of two blocks created at the same time, colliding and causing the network to choose between one of the two or three blocks created at the same time.

The Hashgraph on the other end passes every transaction one by one, and records every event, ensuring a 100% efficiency, though not proven yet because the Hashgraph is a rather new network, the Hashgraph is said to save up everything.

• OPEN SOURCE AND PROPRIETARY PLATFORM

The Blockchain uses an open-source platform and has a lot of participants from different backgrounds to engage in developmental projects on the platform, mostly in the crypto world.

The hashgraph on the other hand is based on a patented network, all transactions on the network are first passed through a decentralized application made by an organization known as "swirld"

• TRUSTWORTHINESS:

The Blockchain has been around longer than the Hedera hashgraph, which was properly designed fully in 2016. So most of it's aces over the blockchain might not be fully practical, and will need to be tested out for longer, to ensure that the efficiency's mathematical theory is not just a theory.

THE VOTING TECHNOLOGY I PREFER FOR NIGERIA AND WHY

For elections as important as the presidency elections, i would like it if my country imbibed the Hashgraph voting method, where every verified citizen would vote, and the results and messages of each vote is sent to every citizen to ensure a very transparent and smooth election.

Also, it will improve the number of citizens who actually go to vote, because tansparency brings interest, and this method is also stress free, compared to establishing poll centers alone.

QUESTON 4

Explore Hedera Hashgraph link show screenshots.

I have used the link to get to the Hedera site, and have explored all the options and i'm ready to explain all the sections of the site so here it is:

• THE WELCOME PAGE:
  The Hedera welcome page shows the options that are available on the site at the top of the first screen display, and we will dive into these options, to properly assess what the site has to offer.
  
  
  
• NETWORK:
  Hovering over this option opened up the box dialogue that exposed some network services that Hedera Hashgraph offers, and some information for proper understanding of the network.
  The two network services shown are the "Token service" and the "Consensus service"
  
  
  

The token service:

The Token service option when clicked leads to a page where the user is allowed to create fungible and non-fungible tokens on the platform without the smart contract strings attached.

The consensus service:

The consensus service offered by Hedera enables the user to confirm the authenticity of the timestamping of a tranasaction carried out on the hashgraph platform.

Dashboard: Here we can see the the total activity of the Hereda Haragraph and know the necessary values to use and analyse the prosperity of the system

• DEVS:
  This button when hovered on with the mouse opened up a dialogue box showing links to information about Hedera Hashgraph in general but in different compartments.
  The Docs: Leads to a page where the Hedera Hashgraph is properly explained, and links to documents that clear out the concept are found
  The Hedera SDK: The link leads to the platform changed into whatever language that the user would prefer.
  There are four Resource links available, they are:
  The Integrations: It is a link that gives you access to Hedera tools that a user can use to integrate and tweak an already existing app of the user's on the platform. It also possesses access to Hedera plugins.
  The Fees: This link educates the user on the various fees attached to transactions carried out on the platform.
  The open source: This option leads to a link where the Hedera Hashgraph is currently contemplating improving by being open-sourced.
  The Learning center: Here is where there is proper education about haragraph and all it is about, and also information about it's DLT.
  
  
  

• THE USE CASES:
  The use cases option shows a variety of other things that you can do on the Hedera Hashgraph platform, they include a chance to reduce payment fees and unlock new levels on the platform.
  One of the options that really caught my eye on this dialogue box is the "gaming" opton, that hedera offers, Users are allowed to access a decentralized gaming system according to the write-up.
  

  
  
  

• HBAR:
  The H-Bar is Hereda Hashgraph's own token, and in this option, the site hold up links that tell the user all about the token.
  

  
  
  

The overview: shows the summary and information about the HBAR token and a little about it's history.
Account creation: Here, the user is given the option and choice to open an online account for the purpose of transacting with the token.
Wallets & Exchanges: here shows the wallets that Support of the H-Bar token, and some exchange platforms where the token could be traded.

• GOVERNANCE:
  The governance of the Hedera Hashgraph is all learned of by this link. The governance is made by a board of close to 40 very diversified organizations, which are diversified over several sectors. They are responsible for maintenance, and decentralization. But this is ironic to me because in a true decentralized network, there should not be any governance.

All the screenshots above are gotten from the hedera site

CONCLUSION

The Hashgraph Technology is a very good development in my opinion, Though it is new, and needs a few more tests in my opinion to really test run it's efficiency. It is faster than the blockchain and uses a different aproach when it comes to network consensus.

We have looked at the comparisons of the hashgraph with the blockchain, and have discussed how the gossip protocol works, keeping in mingd it's gossip about gossip method.

We also looked at it's unique Asynchronous Byzantine fault tolerance of the Hashgraph technology, and how it is different from the normal FBT.

All images either screenshotted and referenced, or designed by me with the help of canva

I hope @pelon53 enjoyed going thorugh this article, and everyone else finds it insightful. I really enjoyed doing the research, Thank you and God bless you.