All about blockchain abstraction

Blockchain abstraction. Let’s understand what it is, how it works, and why it is needed.

The term “abstraction” is used in various fields to describe the process of separating the technical component of a product from the user experience. For example, to send an email, a person doesn’t need to understand the differences between IMAP and POP3 email protocols or learn the SMTP data structure.

Accordingly, blockchain abstraction means the separation of the technical characteristics of decentralized networks from the user interface and the experience of interacting with applications built on them. Among the first ones are:

• use of gas tokens to pay for transactions
• complex mechanics of creating and managing cryptocurrency wallets
• the need to transfer assets between different networks

How does blockchain abstraction work?

Efficiency

Imagine if you could only send messages from iPhone to another iPhone, but not to Android phones. It would be inefficient and impractical. Likewise, users should be able to interact with decentralized applications (dApps) across different blockchains without any unnecessary obstacles.

The goal of blockchain abstraction is to remove or hide the complexities of blockchain technology, allowing users to focus on the functionality and benefits of the dApps they use. For example, if Sarah wants to use a new dApp called XYZ, she doesn’t need to worry about which blockchain it is built on. From the user’s point of view, she just wants it to work well and fulfill its purpose.

Similarly, millions of people use the internet every day, but only a smaller percentage understand the technology behind it and how it works. As long as it works as intended and adds value to users, there is no reason for the average user to fully understand its technical details.

The main advantages of blockchain abstraction

• Defragmentation of liquidity and audience. Abstraction erases barriers that impede the movement of capital and users between different blockchains, thus contributing to the pooling of liquidity and the creation of a global Web3 community;
• Improved interface. Abstraction tools allow to eliminate complex elements from the process of using programs, such as the need to generate mnemonic phrases or confirm each interaction with a smart contract;
• empowerment of developers. Due to defragmentation, product creators are not limited to the user base or the amount of capital in a particular blockchain and can choose the infrastructure based on technical needs;
• increased compatibility with traditional platforms. One of the areas of abstraction involves creating an easy experience of using Web2 and Web3 platforms. For example, through common interfaces, as in the case of Blinks in Solana.

Blockchain abstraction also leads to a change in the perception of the industry – from a PvP arena, where a project can get an audience or liquidity only at the expense of competitors, to a single Web3 space with shared resources.

Difficulties of implementation

The heterogeneous landscape of the blockchain industry and the lack of established standards create barriers to the implementation of abstraction at several levels at once:

1. Economic. Liquidity is the main resource of blockchain ecosystems. It attracts users and developers, i.e. creates a competitive advantage, so each network fights for capital and prevents its outflow. Such fragmentation makes it difficult to create integrated multi-network platforms and provokes deliberate technical incompatibility.
   
2. Cultural. This is expressed in community tribalism and deliberate technical exclusivity of products that seek to protect themselves from competitors.
3. Technical. Different networks may use different programming languages, address standards, encryption methods, blockchain architecture, and so on, which requires developers to adapt the program for each ecosystem and complicates the interaction between them. That’s why we still need bridges, wrapped tokens, or centralized services that eliminate these incompatibilities.

Some of these barriers will be overcome by the overall development of technology, but others will require a shift in the mindset of market participants. In particular, a shift from tribalism to a more universal perception of the industry. Another important aspect is the reorientation of developers from the problems of the “internal” user to the needs of the audience outside Web3.

Conclusion

Blockchain abstraction refers to the simplification of interaction between different blockchain networks. The benefits of blockchain abstraction include liquidity defragmentation and simplified development. It faces challenges in the form of centralization and security risks, as well as potential interoperability issues. However, abstraction can pave the way for interoperable and user-friendly blockchain ecosystems.