Overview

Polkadot is a platform that allows diverse blockchains to transfer messages, including value, in a trust-free fashion; sharing their unique features while pooling their security. In brief, Polkadot is a scalable heterogeneous multi-chain technology.

Polkadot is heterogeneous because it is entirely flexible and makes no assumption about the nature or structure of the chains in the network. Even non-blockchain systems or data structures can become parachains if they fulfill a set of criteria.

Polkadot may be considered equivalent to a set of independent chains (e.g. a set containing Ethereum, Ethereum Classic, Namecoin and Bitcoin) except with important additions: pooled security and trust-free interchain transactability.

Many of the native [[parachains|Parachains]] of Polkadot will be written using a [[Polkadot Runtime Environment|Polkadot Runtime Environment]] SDK (e.g. Parity Technologies' [[Substrate|Substrate]]).

Polkadot Resources

Community

• Riot - Discuss general Polkadot topics and contact Web3 Foundation and Parity Technologies team members.
• Reddit - Share content, tools, and updates.
• Twitter - Updates on the Polkadot platform and community.
• Technical chat - Listen to Core Devs discuss technical topics related to Polkadot.
• Beginner's Chat - Learn about Polkadot and how to interact with the testnet.
• Parity Substrate Chat - Discuss technical topics related to the Polkadot runtime environment.
• Governance Chat - Discuss governance topics related to Polkadot.
• Official Telegram - Discuss general Polkadot topics in this channel. Our main place is Riot, but this is for the folks who prefer Telegram.
• Unofficial Telegram - Discuss general Polkadot topics in this unofficial telegram channel.
• Unofficial Reddit - Unofficial Polkadot discussion.

Read More

• Website - Overview of Polkadot, including FAQ, graphics and videos.
• Medium - Articles and guides on the development and technology.
• White Paper - General Polkadot description.
• Light Paper - Brief, non-technical overview of Polkadot.
• What is Substrate? - Explanation of the framework used to build Polkadot.
• GRANDPA Block Finality - Exploring consensus and finality in Polkadot.
• How Substrate relates to Polkadot - A Tale of Two Technologies Presentation Transcript

Presentations

• Polkadot & Substrate Overview - Dr. Gavin Wood presents Substrate (blockchain in-a-box + VM) and Polkadot, and builds a blockchain on-stage in 30 minutes using Substrate.
• Polkadot Overview - Dr. Gavin Wood presents an overview of Polkadot.
• Polkadot Overview - Dr. Jutta Steiner presents Polkadot.
• Substrate Intro - Dr. Gavin Wood presents Substrate, one of the technologies underlying Polkadot.
• Governance Demo - Dr. Gavin Wood presents the initial governance structure for Polkadot.
• Interoperability Intro - Rob Habermeier presents "Interopability: Connecting the Dots."

Podcasts

• Polkadot Overview - Dr. Gavin Wood chatted about the history of Polkadot and provided a great overview on Zero Knowledge podcast.
• Polkadot Overview - Epicenter interviews Peter Czaban of Web3 Foundation about Polkadot.

Guides

• Polkadot UI - Get started on the testnet.
• Install PoC-2 - Install Polkadot's client and connect to the global PoC-2 testnet.
• Validating on POC-2 - Set-up a validator on the testnet.
• Substrate node - Install and run a Substrate node on BBQ-Birch testnet.
• Get testnet DOTS - Receive the native testnet token.
• Deploy a Parachain - Deploy a blockchain on the testnet.
• Style Guide - Contribute to the Rust implementation of Polkadot.
• Governance - Overview of governance system.
• Preparing to Build - Guide on how to prepare for Polkadot.

Specifications

• Polkadot consensus - In progress documentation of the consensus mechanism.
• Polkadot Spec - Working yellow paper style Polkadot specification.
• Polkadot Wiki - Set of spec drafts, maintained by Parity Technologies.

POC implementations

• Rust - Initial Polkadot implementation.
• Parity Substrate - Implementation of the Polkadot runtime environment.
• JS - Tools, utilities and client.
• POC-2 UI - Browser and apps.
• Telemetry - Information services website for nodes.
• Polkadash - Dashboard displaying validators and governance proposals.
• Polkascan - Real-time multi-chain data for Polkadot Relay Chain and Parity Substrate chains.

Component implementations

• Parity Bridge - Bridge between any two ethereum-based networks.
• ParityDB - Fast and reliable database, optimised for read operations.
• wasmi - WebAssembly interpreter written in Rust.
• Parity WASM - WebAssembly serialization/deserialization in Rust.
• WASM utils - Collection of WASM utilities used in Parity and WASM contract devepment.
• Rust libp2p - The Rust Implementation of libp2p networking stack.