Can you imagine a completely decentralized world? Being able to buy tokens or NFT of your choice from Twitter, a blog or a website. In Solana it is possible thanks to Dialect, which developed a protocol that integrates traditional web2, web3 and social networks into the crypto environment. Making transactions in less than 5 seconds within the Solana blockchain.
Every day the Solana ecosystem offers new ideas and solutions to live better. This marvel was announced on June 25th, and it is now possible to use it and take advantage of how to simplify the interaction between client and user. In addition, Blinks will be an opportunity for small and large digital merchants to offer their products and have better control of their assets, without need to use traditional payments such as credit cards.
Actions and Blinks are an ambitious new protocol in collaboration with Solana—& a developer stack by Dialect—to share Solana transactions everywhere.
Actions are a protocol for creating & delivering Solana transactions through URLs, making Solana sharable everywhere. Blinks, or Blockchain Links, are clients that detect Action URLs & unfurl them into full experiences.
Key Features:
Seamless Integration: Automatically detects Action-compatible URLs and converts them into user-friendly, actionable Blinks on supported websites.
Wallet Support: Compatible with Solana wallets including Phantom, Backpack, and Solflare, ensuring secure and streamlined transactions.
Enhanced Interactivity: Blinks provide a standardized interface for executing actions on the blockchain, making it easier than ever to participate in the Solana ecosystem.
Actions
Actions are APIs that deliver signable transactions, and soon signable messages. Actions are hosted at URLs, and are therefore sharable by their URL.
Actions are comprised of URL scheme, a GET route, and a POST route to the Action Provider:
A URL scheme for identifying Actions Providers
A GET request and response, to and from, an action URL, for presenting the client with human-readable information.
A POST request and response, to and from an action URL, for constructing transactions (and soon messages) for signing and submission to the blockchain.
These 3 aspects of the Actions Specification, and go into greater detail on action execution & lifecycle, how multiple actions are linked and returned in single GET calls.
Blinks
Blinks introspect Actions APIs & construct interfaces for them.
Clients that support Blinks detect Actions-compatible URLs and “unfurl” them into a standardized interface.
Blinks may be linked to Actions in at least 3 ways:
Sharing an explicit Action URL: In this case, only supported clients may render the Blink. There will be no fallback link preview, or site that may be visited outside of the unsupporting client.
Sharing a link to a website that is linked to an actions API via an actions.json file on the website root domain.
Embedding an Action URL in an “interstitial” site or mobile app deep link URL that understands how to parse actions.
Chrome extensions may be used to add Blink support to clients that would not normally support Blinks. E.g. Twitter web may be made to support Blinks if chrome extensions such as Backpack, Sofllare or Phantom integrate Blinks capabilities.
When one action is being taken from a set of available actions, all other actions become un-executable until such time as the current executing action succeeds or fails (incl. timeout).
In future versions, this may no longer be true, and more flexible experiences may be created.
Blinks do not need to persist their lifecycle beyond the in-the-moment, single user session. If a user refreshes the client, or leaves and comes back at a later time, past or current interactions with the Blink are no longer reflected by the client. This includes not just succeeded actions, but also actions in the middle of execution.
Build your first action
Visit Dialect's Dashboard for a step-by-step guide to:
Create your first Action using open source, forkable examples in our Github.
Test your action on https://dial.to
Register your action.
Share your Actions on Twitter, and bring them to life with Blinks support through your favorite extension like Phantom, Backpack, or Dialect's dedicated Blinks extension.
The Blinks Effect
Blinks will embed Solana transactions everywhere on the internet; Solana breaking the 40 million daily transaction threshold occurred after Solana developers unveiled “blinks,” short for “blockchain links,” which are new Solana primitives that enable people to turn onchain actions such as voting, donating, and swapping into a URL link that can be shared on social media and the wider internet web.
As a result, traditional web2 internet sites can become a place where users can initiate onchain Solana transactions. In the past 24 hours, wallet transfers alone consumed over $1 million in gas, making it the largest gas-consuming category more than the gas consumption of DeFi, memecoins, and infrastructure protocols combined.
The possibilities offered by Blinks are endless, but I can assure you that all of this will benefit the Solana blockchain and its massive adoption by many users, and right in the midst of negotiations for the approval of its ETF. Solana will go to the moon and may surpass its historical maximum.
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