Please describe your proposed solution.
A brief description of the ENCOINS protocol
ENCOINS is a privacy protocol on Cardano. Users can create NFTs (a.k.a. encrypted coins or encoins) with secret redeeming values. These NFTs store their redemption values (ADA) in the encrypted format using zero-knowledge proofs. A user can burn a coin to redeem its value from the protocol. You can send, gift, or trade encoins as any other NFT.
The protocol has a second mode of operation called the ENCOINS Ledger Mode. In this mode, users can store their coins directly in the protocol (at the Cardano script address). Thus, it is possible to make confidential payments even without having a Cardano wallet.
We have several partnerships inside the Cardano ecosystem currently in the works. All of them provide meaningful, practical use cases for the protocol. Some could be announced any day now.
The components of our solution
Redesign UI to be more wallet-like but with additional privacy features.
Following the feedback from our community, we want to streamline user interaction with the protocol by hiding its complexity from the users. The wallet-like UI will be more familiar to a typical user, increasing our protocol's adoption.
Design, document, and implement a set of public APIs to query the on-chain state of the protocol and build protocol transactions.
It will allow other Cardano DApps and services to access the protocol programmatically, increasing the potential for collaborations and integrations. It also opens the door for more direct integrations with the existing Cardano wallets (for example, a button that encrypts/decrypts selected assets in the wallet).
Build frontend for the Agora-based DAO.
In our efforts toward full decentralization, it is critical to transition the ENCOINS DAO treasury from the current multi-signature script to an Agora-based smart contract. To do so, we need to connect Agora smart contract and existing APIs to our own frontend. After considering different options, we believe it to be a better solution.
Make the most out of our partnerships.
The team size limits the extent to which we can collaborate with our partners. With the additional funding provided by this grant, we could hire an additional smart contract/frontend developer who will focus on integrations.
How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?
The more user needs we, as the developer community, can satisfy, the faster Cardano will grow. We have received many requests for features and collaborations ranging from a system that protects NFT collectors from tracking to confidential payments for refugees. With ENCOINS v2 and the proposed development roadmap, we could satisfy those needs, bringing more people to the Cardano ecosystem and increasing value for the existing users.
How do you intend to measure the success of your project?
Once our project launches on the mainnet, we will track the number of transactions and TVL of the protocol.
In addition, the success will be measured in the number and quality of collaborations with other ecosystem projects.
Finally, we value and consider the opinion of our community and our fellow ecosystem builders.
Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?
The output of this project is a permissionless Dapp that will be available to all Cardano users. As the project is open-sourced, the code will be shared as well. We have built and continue to improve our own developer tools that might be of interest to the Cardano developer community. More on that, check out our proposal in the OSDE category.