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Blockchain Intents for Kids 💻

Introduction

To all our Blockchain kids,
Imagine being a kid and cooking your own food 😵
Instead you just tell your Mommy 🥰 that you are hungry, and want to eat Kheer 😋🍚
Your mommy cooks the sweety Kheer (keeping the recipe and ingredients abstract from you) and you enjoy this divine delight!

This is what “Intent” is, derived from the word “Intendere” means aim or purpose. Kinda similar to the word “Intention” which is general desire whereas Intent is more specific, formal, indicating a firm resolve to get something done.
Intent is: You say it, Blockchain does it 🔮✨

Intent in Blockchain is a specific goal a user wants to achieve on the blockchain network. It’s essentially a way of expressing your desired outcome, rather than providing step-by-step instructions for how to get there.

For Example:
(Traditional Life):
You want to buy an NFT of Mickey Mouse. What you’ll have to do now is:

  1. Find a marketplace that sells the NFT 🏡
  2. Browse listings and compare prices 👀
  3. Look for offers within your budget 💰
  4. Initiate a complex transaction involving crypto wallets and gas fees 🥵

Micky Mouse knows it’s all crazy to search NFTs 😵

(Mentos Intent Life):
You express your intent “I want to buy Mickey Mouse NFT for the best possible price”. The blockchain system understands your intent and searches for the intent solution across various marketplace, to search for the best price and gas fee. With just a confirmation, the system executes the transaction on your behalf, acquiring the Mickey Mouse NFT.
The intent-based system acts as your intermediary, handling the complexities behind the scenes while you focus on your desired outcome: obtaining your Mickey Mouse NFT.

But why will someone complete my Intent 🤔

Simple, for simplifying UX (User Experience) 😌

  • people and programs earn rewards for being ‘solvers’ and fulfil users’ intents 💰
  • Competition between Blockchain services and providers, everyone wants to attract new users and satisfy their existing users 👊🏻
  • Blockchains want to Collaborate together to solve problems like Scalability Trilemma by implementing Interoperability 🔁
  • Blockchain technology is constantly evolving, and being an early adopter of Intents can be profitable🤑
  • Blockchains can build reputation for reliability and efficiency by fulfilling users’ intents 🗿
  • Blockchain Intent solvers are specialized thus completing user’s intent and earn solvers a share in profit 😉

Types of Intents

Router Protocol Cross-Chain Intent Framework streamlines Intents into two distinct categories:

  1. Abstract Intents:
    These are initial expressions of a user’s goal and lack specifications. It’s like telling “I want ice-cream” but of which flavor, coned or bar, kulfi or frozen dessert 🤔?
    In Blockchain terms, user says “I want to stake USDT,” this shows their desire but lacks crucial details like the blockchain network or the staking platform. This kind of intent is too broad and needs more details to become actionable.
  2. Executable Intents:
    These intents are well-defined and actionable. They include all necessary specifics, turning a user’s wish into a clear plan of action.
    It’s like asking for “a chocolate flavored ice-cream scoop with toasted almonds topped with molten cocoa” 😋🍧
    In Blockchain terms, the intent to “Stake 100 USDC from my Polygon wallet on a liquid staking platform on Ethereum” becomes executable when details like the amount, the blockchain network, and the staking platform are specified.

Executable intents further break down into three subcategories:

  • 2.1 Stochastic Intents: These involve a degree of uncertainty in both the process and outcome. For example, asking for “a chocolate flavor ice-cream” is still ambiguous as it does not specifies whether ice-cream is a scoop, kulfi, cone or waffle. Similarly, staking 100 USDC on Ethereum could result confusion in different types of tokens, depending on the chosen staking platform.
  • 2.2 Semi-deterministic Intents: The outcome is known, but the path to get there may vary. You wanted Vanilla ice-cream with chocolate sauce topped with butter scotch nuts which is not available right now so you choose Choco cookie as toppings instead, you being flexible with your choice. Similarly, taking 100 USDC on Lido (Ethereum) will result in receiving stETH, but the transaction’s specifics, like the DEX used or the bridge for transferring funds, are not fixed so anything available at that moment can be used.
  • 2.3 Deterministic Intents: Both the journey and the destination are predefined. You confidently declare your intent: “I want one scoop of mint chocolate chip ice cream in a waffle cone, no substitutions!”

‘Intent’ Sounds like AI, innit?

My Car says Meow 🐱‍💻

All that automates, is not AI 😉.
Intents may or may not use AI. They may use ML NLP models to specifically tokenize abstract intent statements (which are not specific and lacks information) to determine distinguish actions.
Router Protocol CCIF uses Adaptors to execute blockchain actions.
The current Router CCIF is primarily composed of the following:

  1. Intent Adapters:
    They take Intents and actually performs the action on Blockchain Machine.
    Technically: Responsible for executing blockchain actions like swapping, bridging, or staking.
  2. Adapter Registry Module (ARM):
    Acts like “Quality Check” for Intent Adapters. It makes sure the Intent Adapters are up-to date and follow the same protocol so that things work reliable and smooth.
    Technically: it maintains the standardization and integrity of intent adapters for effective usage by Intent Solvers.
  3. Intent Solvers: Before delegating tasks to adapters, these solvers figure out what exactly and actually is supposed to be done. They calculate transaction fees, price fluctuations (slippage) and makes sure that there’s enough of specific currency available.
    Technically: Prepares and simulates call data for the executable flow, calculates slippages and fees, and determines the initial execution point.

Future of Router’s CCIF Intents

The current iteration of Router’s Cross-chain Intent Framework can only work on ‘executable intents’ if they are ‘semi-deterministic’ or ‘deterministic’. To enable support for abstract intents and stochastic executable intents, Router Protocol is working on a dedicated Intent Resolution Module (IRM), a system based on a large language model (LLM) that converts abstract user intents into programmable ones.

Where can I use Intents (specifically Cross-Chain)👽

  1. Cross-chain DeFi Applications: Seamlessly swap cryptocurrencies and earn interest across different blockchains. Intents allow users to simply tell the system what they want to achieve (e.g.: “Swap 1 ETH for USDC on the best exchange”) and let it handle the complex cross-chain transactions behind the scenes.
  2. Cross-chain NFT Marketplace: Those days are retired when users needed technical knowledge to buy or sell NFTs across different blockchain platforms. Intents allow users to clearly state their desire (e.g.: “Buy a Mickey Mouse NFT for less than 1 ETH”) and the system finds the NFT and executes the purchase across the relevant chains.
  3. Automated Portfolio Rebalancing: Maintaining a balanced portfolio across different blockchains can be a hassle. Intents let you define your investment goals (e.g.: “Keep 60% of my portfolio in ETH and 40% in stablecoins”).
  4. Cross-chain Governance: Participating in decision-making for projects built on different blockchains becomes effortless. Intents allow you to simply express your vote (e.g.: “Vote YES on proposal X for Project Y”) and the system ensures your vote is securely cast on the appropriate blockchain.
  5. Interoperable Metaverse Experience: Move freely between virtual worlds built on different blockchains. Intents allow users to easily transfer in-game assets or virtual currencies between these worlds (e.g.: “Send my spaceship from Metaverse A to Metaverse B”).
  6. Cross-chain Identity Management: Sharing your digital identity across different blockchains becomes secure and controlled. Intents allow you to specify what information you’re willing to share (e.g., “Share my verified email address with this DeFi app”) and the system handles the secure transfer on your behalf.
  7. Cross-chain Gamified DeFi: Earning rewards and managing assets within play-to-earn games built on different blockchains becomes a breeze. Intents allow you to express your in-game actions (e.g.: “Claim my rewards and convert them to ETH”) and the system executes the transactions seamlessly across the relevant chains.

Challenges and Solution to Intents ☕

  1. Challenge 1: Adapter Time Estimation You want to send a message to your crush 😙. Its kinda hard to determine the time when she sees the message and replies (she might be sitting with her mom, or is washing dishes right now 😊).
    Estimating the time for cross-chain communications through bridge adapters is non-deterministic and varies significantly.Solution: Use experience from your past interactions to determine when she is free or is with her mom (or is washing dishes 😗). This way you can determine the time when she will reply.
    Similarly, system can learn from past data and transactions to determine the estimated time taken to complete the transaction, this helps predict how long it might take in future, knows as “heuristic approach”.
  2. Challenge 2: External RPC Dependency
    Imagine a taxi trying to get information for you from a giant city named Blockchain. It uses a decentralized taxi stand known as RPC (used to request a service from a program located in another computer on a network without having to understand the network’s details). If there is more traffic around taxi stand, your system might get struck.
    Solution: Use a Backup taxi stand to receive information in case others are jammed. OR Own a taxi stand of your own 😎 this way you will have more reliability, and control over transactions but is costlier.
    Use alternate RPCs in case of traffic and delays. OR establish a full dedicated node of your own than relying on third party RPCs. It provides more stability and control over data retrieval.

Conclusion

Blockchain Intents is a revolutionary technology that aims to enhance accessibility and User Experience by allowing users to express their goals in natural language, thus onboarding non-tech users into the crypto ecosystem seamlessly.
Intent based system are still in early stage of development. So before diving in, make sure to DYOR (Do Your Own Research) and read whitepapers!

Thanking You

Copywrite, Owned and Written by: Harsh Soni