Metronome Update — September 2018

Since Metronome launched in late June of 2018, we have been working hard to support and expand its ecosystem — technical documentation, community engagement, meetups, and conference participation. Following the team’s last update, there have been a few developments in the milestone timeline, mobile wallet, and third-party exchanges.

Increased support from third-party exchanges

In addition to accessing new and current MET via the Daily Supply Lots (DSL) and the Autonomous Converter Contract (ACC), several third-party exchanges have elected to support Metronome. Initially available through smaller and decentralized exchanges, the Metronome community was excited to hear that Bittrex and UpBit also chose to support Metronome, adding even more ways for the community to interact with and use the currency.

In particular, this is useful to higher-volume purchasers. These users were previously unable to purchase the amount they wanted from the Initial Supply Auction without dividing it across incremental or smaller amounts from the ACC to avoid the associated price slippage. (The math that determines the ACC’s price and slippage associated with selling to it can be found in the Owner’s Manual).

Milestone Timeline Update

As to timeline, there is one question on the top of the community’s mind: “When is the first chain-hop?” The Metronome team has updated their ETA for the Ethereum Classic chain-hop from Q3 2018 to Q1 2019.

As the community is well aware, the Metronome team has always held itself maintaining to the quality of code and ecosystem over arbitrary dates. A target chain’s contract deployment is no different. As there is only the one chance to deploy a contract, and get it right, we apply the same attention to detail to a new deployment as the initial launch itself.

Thorough auditing requires that the team test all of the transactions that have happened on Ethereum on Ethereum Classic. This is a necessary step for the first chain-hop to ensure correctness in functionality and global supply. The team recognizes it is best to set a cautious and calculated example when deploying new contracts, publishing technical documentation along the way as a guide for those who deploy subsequent contracts.

The network code for the validators (community participants who will verify the validity of a cross-chain hop) is also under the same scrutiny and is an additional piece to pressure test and audit for the first chain-hop.

To that end, the team is opening some of the validator code for review prior to its wholesale open-sourcing and will publish the validator and cross-chain technical document for the rest of the community prior to deploying Metronome contracts on Ethereum Classic. This is a crucial step to include the community as a whole for public review of the code.

Mobile wallets and desktop wallet improvements

The community has made it clear that they would like a mobile version of the wallet. We are hard at work to release the Android and iOS versions of the Metronome wallet for the community. The Android version of the wallet will be released first, with the iOS version available soon after.

Users will enjoy similar features as the desktop client, with access to the Auctions, the Autonomous Converter, and have a convenient place to store ETH, MET, and more cryptocurrencies in the future.

Improvements to the mobile and desktop wallets are also considerations for the Ethereum Classic chain-hop timeline. Put simply, the team wants the wallets to support chain-hopping at the time of contract deployment so that everyone (not just those who know how to manually call APIs) can enjoy this design feature of Metronome. Similarly, the wallet developers are exploring updates for easier use of mass pay and subscriptions.

Community engagement, meetups, and conferences

As mentioned in a previous update, metronome.io will soon offer more resources for exploring the Metronome ecosystem and community. This will include a streamlined purchasing experience via metronome.io for both the auction and converter, resources geared toward developers for building with Metronome, and more resources for our expanding community.

Offline, Metronome team members have been hosting meetups, flying to and speaking at conferences, and been on the lookout for even more ways to connect the community to one another. Recent meetups and talks in Seattle were excellent opportunities to take the conversation a step further.

The team is finalizing a few more meetups and speaking roles in the coming months (notably, Las Vegas and Oslo), but they are open to suggestions from the community for good meetups to reach out to and conferences to explore.

As noted above, the revamped website will also provide resources for community members to present at their favorite meetups, or even begin their own Metronome specific meetups.

Conclusion

Metronome is up and running and the community is working on hard on expanding the ecosystem and the network effect. With imminent milestones, wallets, new third-party exchange support, and upcoming events, it’s an exciting time to be part of the Metronome community.

• The Metronome Team