Author: Dr. Awesome Doge, early member of the TON core team; Translator: Golden Finance Xiaozou
The name TON Foundation might be known to many, but few know the story of its early contributors—the NEWTON team (the core team of TON).
Through voluntary technical contributions, NEWTON gained recognition from the official Telegram team in 2021, achieving the greatest 'community takeover' technology transfer in blockchain history.
As an early member of NEWTON, let me tell you this story.
1. Introduction: Joining the NEWTON team and the team mission
When I joined the NEWTON team, our main task was clear: to maintain the stability of the TON testnet2 code while enhancing development tools.
Since we did not have direct control over the TON blockchain GitHub repository but needed to continuously update the code, we created a new organization called NEWTON. To ensure smooth network updates, we encouraged the community to use the validators developed by NEWTON as the standard version.
From its inception to June 2021, the NEWTON team completed several groundbreaking developments and infrastructure projects. Let's take a closer look at the 10 key contributions that impacted TON's early development.
（1）mytonctrl: Automated node management tool
Our first major contribution was mytonctrl, a powerful automation tool for node installation and validator setup.
It provides some basic functions such as wallet creation, contract deployment, transaction history retrieval, and even a DNS registration system—interestingly, the DNS at that time was different from the modern NFT-wrapped DNS we see today.
mytonctrl can also configure validators, liteservers, and litclients, making node data access and parsing simpler. In 2021, we added CPU-based mining scripts and automated power testing to simplify TON minting.
（2）tonmon: Visualizing blockchain operational status
Having nodes and accessing data is not enough; we need more visualization tools to monitor the blockchain's operational status.
To better monitor the blockchain's operational status, we created tonmon. This tool tracks key metrics such as block creation time, shard status, dPoS election schedule, validator count and weights, and mining contract status. We can quickly respond to any network anomalies.
This network was very small in its early stages, with only about 80 validators globally.
（3）tonmine: Monitor Giver contracts
We developed tonmine to track TON mining activities. Although there were many different initial givers in the TON blockchain, by 2021 only 10 small givers remained. tonmine displays daily mining statistics for each contract, averaging 20,000 TON per contract—totaling 200,000 TON across all contracts.
Mining difficulty varies greatly between different givers, depending on the number of miners—some givers have lower difficulty due to fewer miners, while others have extremely high difficulty.
（4）Cross-chain bridge
Before TON had jetton or NFT standards, we recognized the importance of cross-chain compatibility. The NEWTON team developed a TON native bridge for ERC-20 tokens on EVM-compatible chains and successfully tested it on bridge.ton.org. This made seamless transfers between TON, Ethereum, and BSC possible.
（5）@cryptobot: Telegram Bot wallet
In 2021, before the launch of Telegram's mini app, a team member developed the @cryptobot Telegram wallet. It initially supported BTC, TON, BNB, and USDT. After the launch of Telegram's mini app, the wallet underwent a thorough update.
（6）toncenter: Simplified blockchain data access
With toncenter, developers no longer need to set up full nodes, research lite clients or liteservers, or worry about the serialization data format. toncenter provides a public API that greatly simplifies on-chain data access for various wallets and block explorers.
Although TON's infrastructure has evolved to have more API provider options, like today's tonxapi.com, toncenter continues to serve developers, proving the strength of its design.
（7）explorer.toncoin.org: The first block explorer for TON
The first TON blockchain explorer was integrated into the core codebase of explorer.toncoin.org. While incredibly fast, its data representation is too technical for most users.
（8）ton.sh: Next-generation browser
To address the complexity of explorer.toncoin.org, we created ton.sh. After solving the challenges of blockchain data deserialization, we published it using a public API.
ton.sh focuses on basic functions: wallet balance, transactions, especially memos. Memos are crucial for early TON users; before TON Connect or complex DeFi contracts emerged, memos were the command operations, especially for deposit operations on exchanges.
Although new browsers like TONScan and TONViewer later emerged, ton.sh remains a historic milestone in TON development.
（9）TonWeb: Basic JavaScript SDK
Since TON smart contracts use two challenging languages, Fift and Func, the NEWTON team developed TonWeb, a JavaScript SDK that simplifies wallet creation, deployment, and trading.
（10）ton wallet: My first TON wallet
This TON wallet dates back to the Telegram era; it was my first wallet and I still use it now.
2. Historic recognition: The open letter from NEWTON to the official Telegram team
By June 2021, the NEWTON team made significant contributions, including operating public liteservers, DHT servers, and archive nodes to maintain network stability. Then, toya-yanot wrote an open letter to the TON-blockchain team documenting our year of work and requesting institutional permission on GitHub.
The letter listed the two leaders of NEWTON and key team members.
Yes, I (Dr. Awesome Doge) am also on the list.
At that time, I thought it was just an open letter—a great way to showcase our contributions to the network without expecting any response.
But to our surprise, the official Telegram team responded on June 30, 2021.
This marks the opening of a new chapter in the history of the TON blockchain.
3. Reflecting on the past, looking to the future: Builder notes
Looking back on this incredible journey, the early contributions of the NEWTON team went far beyond code. Every line of code, every tool we developed, every sleepless night of maintenance—these efforts laid the foundation for TON today.
TON's explosive growth in 2024 saw thousands of builders joining the ecosystem, validating our belief during those challenging early stages—that TON's potential is worth fighting for.
NEWTON members are spread across the globe, with each member supporting TON in their own way. My focus remains on the needs of developers and development in Asia (I am the only team member who speaks Mandarin). My team TONX is building the necessary infrastructure for the TON ecosystem:
TONX API: Powerful RPC & API for all dapps
Tonkey App: Multi-signature wallet managing 400 million assets
TonStake: The largest staking pool
TON Research: Community center for developers
TON Hacker House events span Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Taipei
Stay tuned for the future.
The spirit of NEWTON lives on. This is just the beginning. Let's build TON together.
