RAEN in NEAR's desert: tooling for ambitious Open Web apps

## 🌧 RAEN in NEAR's desert: tooling for ambitious Open Web apps

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Also, here's the [source](https://github.com/raendev/vision-talk) and a [standalone version](./standalone/)

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# 🌧

# RAEN in NEAR's desert: *tooling for ambitious Open Web apps*

<small>@raendev</small>

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???

We're gonna talk about two problems,  
a big problem and a small problem.

---

# *1*

???

The big problem is ecosystem-wide,  
blockchain-ecosystem-wide,  
dapp/web3/Open Web/dweb-ecosystem-wide,  
and that problem is this:

no one knows how to build dapps

???

No one knows how to build dapps!  
Ok that's not strictly true,  
some people have figured out some  
useful patterns. But good luck  
figuring out those patterns  
if you're new.  
Most people don't know,  
most documentation doesn't go that far,  
most tooling isn't that expansive.

---

# *2*

???

The small problem is with NEAR smart contracts.

black boxes

???

They're black boxes.  
They don't play nicely with others.  
Only the author of a contract  
can really dig in  
and figure out how to interact with that contract.  
Everyone else needs to search for the source code,  
or deconstruct web app workflows,  
or give up.

---

???

And now I assert

## *2*

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that solving the small problem

🗝

## *1*

???

is key to fixing the big one.

---
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And if that's true, that's great!  
Because we already solved the small problem.  
The solution

# *RAEN*

???
is RAEN.

---

???

To understand RAEN,  
let's see how other people solved this problem.

Ethereum solved it with
--

# *ABI*

???

an "ABI" system.  
ABIs are JSON files,  
generated from a smart contract,  
that contract authors distribute off-chain,  
using GitHub or some other system.  
(Pagoda fka Near Inc are copying this system.)

---

*WebAssembly* aka *Wasm*

???

WebAssembly aka Wasm (NEAR's runtime VM),  
are solving this same problem

---

# *WIT*
???
with Wit,  
--

*WebAssembly*
???
WebAssembly
--

*Interface*
???
Interface
--

*Types*
???
Types.  
More compact and readable  
than the JSON of ABIs,  
Wit fits easily into a Custom Section  
of a deployed smart contract.  
So that's exactly what RAEN does.

---

???

This leapfrogs the ABI system.

RAEN inspects your Rust smart contract  
and generates Wit from it;  
compiles your contract,  
injects the Wit,  
and compresses the whole thing,  
making the end result smaller  
than if you built without RAEN.

Now anyone can generate  
any tooling they need  
for any given smart contract.

---

# *some-contract.near*

???

Just by knowing a contract's name,  
You can generate

↪ *some-contract.json*

???

an ABI.

---

# *some-contract.near*

↪ *some-contract.ts*

???

Or Typescript.

---

# *some-contract.near*

↪ *some-contract.rs*

???

Or cross-contract calls.

---

# *some-contract.near*

↪ *some-contract.sh*

???

Or a CLI.

---

[![Inspect some-contract.near using a schema built with RAEN and stored on NEAR](img/raen-admin.png)](https://raen.dev/admin)

???

Or an admin panel web app.

This one already exists.  
It's called RAEN Admin.  
You can `raen build` your contracts  
and enjoy it  
teach with it  
collaborate with it

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# *raen.dev/admin*

???

today.

---

???

A RAEN-maximized version of NEAR  
becomes a fully-typed smart contract ecosystem,  
a development platform  
where all developers  
can learn about  
and script against  
and build on top of  
any already-deployed program  
with confidence.

Which circles us back to

---

# *1*

no one knows how to build dapps

???

the big problem.

"No one knows how to build dapps"  
and what this really means  
is that we're all still figuring it out  
together.

New patterns are emerging,  
new visions gaining salience.

---

???

One vision for the Open Web

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![](img/arch/thin-app.svg)

???

is thin apps

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![](img/arch/thin-app-open-data.svg)

???

that access open data.  
Apps that read, write, interact  
with data from many smart contracts,

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![](img/arch/thin-app-own-data.svg)

???

some the app developers wrote themselves,

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![](img/arch/thin-app-other-data.svg)

???

some that pre-existed—  
public infrastructure.

---

???

And if that's your vision  
what a boon  
is a fully-typed ecosystem  
of public infrastructure.

We're going long on this vision.

---
![](img/framework/build.svg)
???

RAEN, born a build tool,  
will grow into a framework,  
helping ambitious developers

---
![](img/framework/create.svg)
???
compose secure, well-architected smart contracts,  
yes, and more than that.  
Because ambitious apps  
need more than just smart contracts.

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![](img/framework/frontend.svg)
???
They need frontends,

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![](img/framework/indexing.svg)
???
indexing layers,

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![](img/framework/complete.svg)
???
off-chain storage.  
RAEN will pull these all together,  
as well as yet-undiscovered architectural patterns,  
and help devs keep apps fresh  
with all these latest discoveries  
as they emerge.

---
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???
Here's what this will look like in practice.  
Let's follow three builders,
--
# 🐊
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Ali,
--
     🐝
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Bob, and
--
     🐨
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Cal.  
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# 🐊

???
Ali just switched to NEAR  
from some other blockchain,  
and wants to build new defi offerings.  
She opens her command line,  
--
`raen generate contract amm`

???
types "raen generate contract amm",  
gets a new Automated Market Maker contract,  
--

`raen generate contract ft`

???
types "raen generate contract ft",  
gets a new Fungible Token contract,  
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# 🐊
```
├── Raenfile  
├── contracts/  
│   ├── amm/  
│   └── ft/  
└── tests/  
```
???
and starts hooking them together,  
feels immediately productive  
and useful  
in her new ecosystem  
with her new programming language.  
---
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# 🐝

???
Bob is a business founder frontend dev  
with a product remixing data from  
three existing contracts.  
In his command line, he types  
--
`raen new project --use`

???
"raen new project --use" followed by the names  
of those
--

`contract1.near`

???
three
--

`contract2.near`

???
smart
--

`contract3.near`

???
contracts.  
---
class:left
# 🐝
```
├── Raenfile  
└── frontend/  
```
???
Gets a project configured  
with a fully-typed frontend app,  
that even gives him some reasonable starting UI,  
---
class:left
# 🐝
```
├── Raenfile  
├── frontend/  
└── subgraphs/  
```
???
and some Subgraph code to index those three contracts,  
---
class:left
# 🐝
```
├── Raenfile  
├── frontend/  
├── subgraphs/  
└── tests/  
```
???
and tests to show how it's done.  
he's already busy building business logic;  
doesn't need to bother with boilerplate  
or any reverse engineering.  
---
class:left
# 🐨
???
Cal is making the switch from web2 to web3,  
participating in their first hackathon.  
--

`raen new project`
???
They type "raen new project",  
get a tutorial app—  
---
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# 🐨
```
├── Raenfile  
├── contracts/  
├── frontend/  
├── subgraphs/  
└── tests/  
```
???
contracts, frontend, subgraphs, storage,  
all hooked together.  
They learn the ropes and build an app,  
are proud of what they build,  
continue hacking with their team after the awards ceremony,  
grow the codebase easily from  
proof of concept to  
full-scale public infrastructure.  
---
???
That's where we're headed.  
That's how easy we want NEAR to be.  
We will get there in six months.

And who are "we"  
anyway?  
---
*@chadoh*

![](img/chad.jpeg)
???
Mostly just me and this guy,  
---
*@willemneal*

![](img/willem.jpeg)
???
Willem,  
after parting ways with Near Inc last fall,  
We wanted to keep working on NEAR;  
explored other options,  
but we're literally vested in NEAR,  
and NEAR has the best developer experience,  
best Account Name system,  
best scaling architecture.  
So in January we formed Aha Labs,  
built RAEN in just 4 months  
---
*read:* AhaLabs.dev

![](img/ahalabs-recap.png)
???
while delivering on multiple other commitments,  
including the most-used NFT code in NEAR, TENK.
---
*pixel8.io*

![](img/pixel8.png)
???
We also collaborated with the Pixel8 team  
to make RAEN Admin look slick,  
and we'll merge with their team for these next
---
# 🌧

???
Six months.  
A small team.  
(A small budget!)  
Shipping well-loved tools  
above our weight class.  
You'll love what we pull off.
--
raen.dev

twitter.com/raendev

github.com/raendev

???
Thanks for listening.  
See you at NEARCON.