Proposal for TxPipe to Provide Infrastructure Services to the Indigo Protocol through the Demeter.run Platform

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Introduction:

TxPipe, is a leading player in the Cardano ecosystem focused on developer tools and developer experience. Demeter.run, is the cloud infrastructure platform they built to provide managed and ready-to-use resources specialized in the Cardano blockchain.

TxPipe aims to enhance the Indigo Protocol by provisioning managed Cardano infrastructure resources through the Demeter.run platform. In alignment with the principles of the Indigo DAO, TxPipe seeks approval from the DAO by way of this proposal, which outlines the services to be provided.

Services to be provided:

We propose that the Indigo DAO authorize the Indigo Foundation to sign a Services Schedule with TxPipe for the following services over the next 12 months.

TxPipe is ready to provision and maintain, through the Demeter.run platform, access with reserved throughput to highly-available instances of:

  • Cardano Kupo
  • Cardano Ogmios

The resources provisioned on the Demeter platform will expose publicly accessible endpoints for each Cardano network, along with the necessary authentication keys. The services will support the following usage levels per resource, backed by an SLA of 99.9%:

  • Kupo: max throughput of 200 req/sec
  • Ogmios: max active connections of 100

Goal of the proposal:

The introduction of Demeter as a service provider aims to fulfill the following objectives:

  • Simplify cloud infrastructure operations, allowing the Indigo development team to focus on core subjects.
  • Improve reliability of the Indigo platform by utilizing highly available and secure API endpoints.
  • Fulfill a technical requirement using cost-effective infrastructure that can scale as the Indigo protocol grows in usage.

Payment for the future services:

TxPipe proposes a flat monthly fee of $380 (US Dollars) for the services to be provided through Demeter.run. This fee encompasses all aspects, including provisioning, maintenance, security, and support required to guarantee availability and quality of the service.

As for the payment procedures, we propose that Demeter invoice the Foundation on a monthly basis in advance of every usage cycle, with payment due in USD or ADA within 7 days of billing. The Foundation retains the right to cancel any service with a 30-day notice period.

In the spirit of transparency, any adjustments to the monthly fee in the future, based on changes in resource costs or other relevant factors, such as potential scaling beyond the specified throughput limits, will be communicated in advance through the Indigo Protocol Discord and be subject to a further vote of the Indigo DAO.

Conclusion:

TxPipe is committed to providing top-tier infrastructure services to empower the Indigo Protocol’s growth within the Cardano ecosystem. We look forward to collaborating with the DAO to bring this vision to fruition.

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Than you to the TxPipe team for posting this service provider proposal as this is is yet another critical step on the decentralization path for Indigo and all mission critical applications supporting it, such as the infrastructure powering the CTL. Looking forward to the community feedback on this one!

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May we have some links to who you are and materials we can read over including past experiences of similiar services rendered. Thank you

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Here is the TX pipe page

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I like it. TxPipe has some stellar devs and im vaguely familiar with Demeter.run, Kupo and Ogmios. I would love to see more API endpoints supporting the Indigo Protocol and decentralizing some of the cloud infrastructure is an excellent idea. I think the price and terms of the agreement are more than fair. The DAO Treasury currently only holds $INDY so how to acquire the USD for payment may need to be addressed in a separate DAO proposal but that should be easy enough.

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To me, this seems a good investment, if the goal is to have better a infrastructure with a low monthly cost.

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seems good to me,a link will be good

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Very supportive of this. Huge fan of the TxPipe team and these infrastructure services will bolster the strength of the platform. :+1:

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“This fee encompasses all aspects, including provisioning, maintenance, security, and support required to guarantee availability and quality of the service”

Could this be broken out into more detail, please? What are some examples as to how this service would help. What guarantees are included in the small print of this service… ? I see security. What if there is an issue and a drain happens (protocol hack, ETC)? Is this a security against that, or am I misunderstanding? Does the guarantee provide any type of insurance to stakers/CDP holders?

I guess I am just curious to understand more on the details. It sounds like help is a good thing, but I would like to know more.

Thank you!

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It would be useful to get Indigo’s team assessment of how much effort they currently put into the activities that TxPipe is suggesting to outsource to get a fair view on the proposal. Thanks! @Indigooo @IndigoDev

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Seems like a bog-standard IaaS agreement at a reasonable cost.

No dev wants to be wasting time and mind space on infra maintenance.

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Bringing in more builders in any official capacity is a win for me.

Especially if it is cost effective and geared towards scalability, reliability, and security.

Edit:

What might be helpful is how costs scale with increased resource consumption/ protocol utilization

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This is a good initiative which will help core team of Indigo devote more time to future developments.

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Very good question, and an opportunity for TxPipe to share their insights on how they handle such things.

Right now our biggest infrastructure expenditure is the CTL infrastructure, and it also requires a lot of management from our perspective. We are very conscientious of security when it comes to all of our infrastructure, the CTL is part of that. The teams time is spent on occasion reviewing that infrastructure for upgrades, anti-virus, security policies, etc. By moving the infrastructure, which is possible by Demeter, we can focus more of our time on securing other infrastructure, more time on development of the protocol and web app, as well as reduce the costs for the DAO.

I’ve had an opportunity to meet with the TxPipe team to learn more about their security practices and such and I feel they handle security with the upmost importance, similar to us.

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hi @DrOctaFunk, I’m Santiago from TxPipe.

You can find a few references on the platform’s website: https://demeter.run

Just to mention a few of our customers:

  • JPG.store
  • Summon Platform
  • NBX
  • IOG
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hi @giorgos7572, I’m Santiago from TxPipe.

You can use the following links for reference:

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hi @curt557,

TxPipe service would provides access to two specific API:

  • Ogmios: an web-socket RPC layer on top of the Cardano Node
  • Kupo: a chain indexer to query the state of the chain

Before going into details, it’s important to note that none of the above services has any access to sensible keys or data specific to the Indigo protocol. Both APIs provide generic infrastructure that is agnostic of any specific dApp.

The following list provides a non-exhaustive list of concrete tasks involved in the service:

  • setup and configuration of Kupo and Ogmios instances
  • setup and configuration of upstream Cardano Nodes required for Ogmios & Kupo
  • provisioning of cloud infrastructure in multiple availability zones to host the above mentioned tools
  • version updates on new releases of the above mentioned tools
  • upgrade of Cardano nodes on every hardfork
  • monitoring and execution of palliative measures in case of DDOS attacks
  • maintenance of secondary failover instances in case of failure
  • technical support to the core Indigo development team on how to access these APIa
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Thank you. I appreciate the response.

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I agree that this added help with the infrastructure is a worthwhile expense as it allows resources to be used elsewhere in building the Indigo Protocol for the future.

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hi @Swoops,

Demeter services scale by usage. I believe the Indigo team would be more suitable to explain the relationship between Indigo protocol usage and the volume of API calls to Demeter services.

Regardless, I think it’s useful to understand that the current cost reflects the following expected usage:

  • Kupo: max throughput of 200 req/sec
  • Ogmios: max active connections of 100

Cost would scale proportionally to the above usage.

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