Please describe your proposed solution.

Our solution is a practical, open-source, hands-on exploration and adoption of the Aiken language in the real-world context of an existing successful decentralized application, Sundaeswap. This will benefit SundaeSwap’s users with higher throughput, and fix several small inconveniences and Cardano by occupying less space in blocks.

How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?

By reengineering our AMM decentralized exchange's smart contracts from Plutus to Aiken, we will:

1. Demonstrate Aiken's Practicality: We will provide a clear, tangible demonstration of Aiken's capabilities by transforming an existing, successful DEX. This will serve as a powerful proof of concept for Aiken's utility in the Cardano ecosystem.
2. Share Knowledge and Experience: Throughout the process, we will document our journey, capturing insights, challenges, and breakthroughs. This knowledge will be invaluable to the Cardano development community as they consider adopting Aiken for their own projects.
3. Foster Aiken's Growth: Our hands-on use of Aiken will provide critical feedback to its developers. This real-world testing and feedback will help inform Aiken's future development, ensuring it meets the practical needs of Cardano DApp developers.
4. Drive Innovation: Our project will stimulate further interest and innovation in the Cardano ecosystem by showcasing Aiken's unique features and strengths. This will help maintain Cardano's position at the cutting edge of blockchain technology.

By translating Sundaeswap's smart contracts into Aiken, Sundae Labs is not just enhancing its own product but actively contributing to the development and maturity of the Cardano ecosystem.

How do you intend to measure the success of your project?

The success of this endeavor can be measured using a combination of qualitative and quantitative metrics.

1. Successful Contract Translation: A successful completion of the translation of Sundaeswap's smart contracts from Plutus to Aiken would be a fundamental measure of success.
2. Contract Performance: After the translation, the smart contracts should be at least as efficient as they were when written in Plutus. We will compare various performance metrics such as transaction speed, throughput, etc.
3. Audit and Security: The new Aiken contracts should pass all security audits and adhere to best practices in smart contract development. We will consider a successful audit as a measure of success.
4. Community Engagement: Measure the amount of engagement from the Cardano community. This can include feedback, contributions to your documentation, adoption of our practices, etc.
5. Developer Feedback: Positive feedback from developers who review or use our translated contracts should also be a success metric. This will come from surveys, comments on shared resources, or public forums.
6. Contribution to Aiken's Development: Feedback provided to the Aiken language's development team and the subsequent incorporation of this feedback into the language's development could be another success metric. This project could also result in upstream pull requests for Aiken.

Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?

1. Project Blog Posts and Updates: Regularly post updates on the project's progress on popular platforms like Medium, the project website’s own blog, and YouTube channel. These posts can detail recent accomplishments, hurdles overcome, and next steps.
2. Release Notes: With each significant release or update, publish detailed release notes outlining the changes, improvements, or bug fixes. These can be included directly in the project repository or on the project's website.
3. Webinars and Online Tutorials: Conduct webinars or create online tutorials to demonstrate the functionality of the ledger-mode fork of the Hydra Node. This will help users understand its features and how to use them.
4. Community Forum Discussions: Use platforms like the Cardano community forum or Reddit to engage with the community. Answer questions, ask for feedback, and participate in discussions about the project.
5. Presentations at Conferences or Meetups: Present the project's results at blockchain or Cardano specific conferences and meetups. This not only reaches a larger audience but also provides an opportunity to receive direct feedback from peers and users.
6. Social Media Announcements: Leverage Twitter, LinkedIn or other popular social media platforms to share project milestones and engage with the community.
7. Documentation: Finally, create robust documentation that thoroughly explains how to use the new Aiken smart contracts, their benefits, and potential use-cases. This documentation should be easily accessible from the project's website and repository.

What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability?

Sundae Labs is a proven and trusted contributor to the Cardano Ecosystem. We built the first AMM DEX on Cardano, and supply turnkey Rewards and Governance products/services to other high-profile projects in the Cardano ecosystem. Additionally, we actively support various ad-hoc activities like Cardano security and scalability R&D. We also contribute actively to ongoing IOG initiatives like Voltaire and other core tech topics of discussion. Learn more at <https://sundae.fi>.

What are the main goals for the project and how will you validate if your approach is feasible?

1. Understanding Aiken: We will need to develop a deep understanding of Aiken's syntax, semantics, and its library ecosystem. We can validate this by building a few small test contracts to begin with and having them reviewed by an experienced Aiken developer or even the language's creators, if possible.
2. Translation of Smart Contracts: Our core goal will be to translate all of Sundaeswap's existing Plutus smart contracts into Aiken. Validation will come from successful compilation, testing, and deployment of these new Aiken contracts.
3. Performance Testing: After translation, we will need to test the performance of the Aiken contracts under a variety of conditions to ensure they are at least as efficient as the Plutus contracts. We can validate this by tracking metrics like transaction throughput, latency, and fees, and comparing them to our Plutus baseline.
4. Security Auditing: Our new Aiken contracts must be audited for security. This could be done in-house if we have the expertise, or by a third-party auditor. Success will be determined by the audit's outcome and remediation of any identified issues.
5. Documentation and Knowledge Sharing: As we go through the translation process, we will document our journey and share our learnings with the broader Cardano community. Success can be validated through feedback from the community and the usefulness of our contributions as perceived by other developers.

We understand that feasibility should be checked early and often. We will start with smaller, less critical contracts and build up to the more complex ones. This way, we'll be able to catch any potential roadblocks early and adjust our approach as needed.

Please provide a detailed breakdown of your project’s milestones and each of the main tasks or activities to reach the milestone plus the expected timeline for the delivery.

Milestone 1: Acquire Aiken Proficiency

• Study Aiken language documentation and existing code examples
• Engage in any available Aiken developer communities for guidance and advice
• Develop and test simple smart contracts in Aiken to gain practical experience

Milestone 2: Plan for Translation

• Review Sundaeswap's Plutus smart contracts and map out their functionalities
• Determine the order of translation based on contract complexity and dependencies
• Create a comprehensive translation plan including key considerations and potential challenges

Milestone 3: Begin Translation of Contracts

• Start with the least complex or critical contract as per the translation plan
• Write the contract in Aiken, test, and debug
• Review the new contract internally and possibly with external Aiken experts for feedback

Milestone 4: Translate All Contracts

• Continue translating remaining smart contracts as per the plan
• Thoroughly test each contract as it's completed
• Regularly review the translated contracts and refine based on feedback and new Aiken insights

Milestone 5: Performance Testing

• Define key performance metrics for comparison (transaction throughput, latency, fees, etc.)
• Conduct performance testing of the new Aiken contracts under various conditions
• Compare performance results with the Plutus baseline

Milestone 6: Security Auditing

• Conduct a thorough security audit of all Aiken contracts
• Address any identified security vulnerabilities
• If necessary, engage a third-party auditor for an independent security review

Milestone 7: Documentation and Knowledge Sharing

• Document the entire translation process, including challenges faced and how they were overcome
• Share insights with the Cardano and Aiken developer communities through blogs, forums, or presentations
• Update Sundaeswap's user-facing documentation with details of the new Aiken contracts

Please describe the deliverables, outputs and intended outcomes of each milestone.

Milestone 1: Acquire Aiken Proficiency

• Deliverables: A team of developers proficient in Aiken, a few simple Aiken smart contracts
• Output: Developers capable of writing and understanding Aiken code
• Intended Outcome: Our team is equipped with the knowledge and skills needed to start translating Sundaeswap's smart contracts into Aiken

Milestone 2: Plan for Translation

• Deliverables: A detailed translation plan, an ordered list of contracts to be translated
• Output: A comprehensive roadmap for the translation process
• Intended Outcome: We have a clear understanding of the scope of the task and a plan to execute it

Milestone 3: Begin Translation of Contracts

• Deliverables: First translated smart contract
• Output: A functional Aiken version of the first Plutus smart contract
• Intended Outcome: We have proof that translation is feasible and have a starting point for the rest of the contracts

Milestone 4: Translate All Contracts

• Deliverables: Aiken versions of all Sundaeswap smart contracts
• Output: Functional, tested Aiken smart contracts ready for performance testing and auditing
• Intended Outcome: All Sundaeswap smart contracts have been successfully translated into Aiken

Milestone 5: Performance Testing

• Deliverables: Performance testing results, comparison report between Plutus and Aiken contracts
• Output: Detailed data on the performance of the Aiken contracts
• Intended Outcome: We know the Aiken contracts perform at least as well as the original Plutus contracts

Milestone 6: Security Auditing

• Deliverables: Security audit report, remediated contracts
• Output: Aiken contracts that have passed rigorous security checks
• Intended Outcome: We can be confident in the security of our Aiken smart contracts

Milestone 7: Documentation and Knowledge Sharing

• Deliverables: Detailed documentation of the translation process, community presentations or blog posts
• Output: Valuable insights and knowledge shared with the Cardano and Aiken developer communities
• Intended Outcome: Our experience with Aiken contributes to the overall knowledge base of the Cardano ecosystem

These deliverables and outcomes will help ensure we stay focused on our project goals and can clearly demonstrate our progress to the Catalyst funding program.

Please provide a detailed budget breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

$82.5k USD / 276,000 ADA / 3 months

Engineer (x1) - $25k/mo

PM/Admin - $2.5k/mo

Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

The Sundae Labs SundaeSwap Aiken Smart Contracts project work will be performed by the Sundae Labs team, housed and primarily based in the US, but with team members also located in Europe and South America.

Our CTO, Pi Lanningham (AKA @Quantumplation), is an active contributor to the Cardano ecosystem. He's an advisor on many large protocols, such as ADA Handle, Liqwid, and Atrium. He's been elected to the Indigo technical working group, gave three technical talks at last year's Cardano Summit, has recently hosted two community Voltaire workshops. He contributes broadly across the Cardano open source ecosystem.

How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

This project represents significant value for money for the Cardano ecosystem in several ways:

• Improving Smart Contract Development: By translating Sundaeswap's existing Plutus smart contracts into Aiken, we will showcase Aiken's capabilities and potential advantages over Plutus. This will make it easier for other developers to adopt Aiken and improve the overall smart contract development experience on Cardano.

• Providing a Roadmap: Our translation effort would serve as a comprehensive case study and roadmap for others considering a similar transition. By documenting our journey, we can help other teams save time, reduce risks, and navigate their own translations more efficiently.

• Testing Aiken's Scalability and Robustness: Sundaeswap, being a high-volume DEX, would provide a real-world testbed for Aiken's robustness, performance, and scalability. The findings from this project could lead to improvements in Aiken and more reliable, efficient smart contracts for all Cardano projects.

• Driving Adoption: Successful implementation of Aiken in a popular DEX like Sundaeswap could spur other projects to consider adopting Aiken, driving overall usage and adoption of the language, thereby increasing its development and refinement.

• Enhancing Security: Aiken's features aim to minimize potential security vulnerabilities. By utilizing Aiken, we may be able to improve the overall security of Sundaeswap, leading to more secure transactions for users and stronger trust in the Cardano ecosystem.

In summary, the investment in this project not only supports the enhancement of Sundaeswap but also contributes to the broader growth and maturity of the Cardano ecosystem. The benefits obtained are likely to far outweigh the costs, making this project a valuable investment for the ecosystem.