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The point seems to be: the blockchain is distributed but if everybody access to it through only a handful of nodes (because they don't want to host their own on

The point seems to be: the blockchain is distributed but if everybody access to it through only a handful of nodes (because they don't want to host their own ones) then it could be centralized and nobody would notice the difference. If there is only one node acting as gateway to the blockchain then it could use PostgreSQL and there would be no differences in trust.

ludamad 5y ago
Are there SQL servers intended for direct public usage? EDIT: I do understand the ubiquity of SQL servers :) I'm asking about ones that expose a good chunk of SQL to end users, since theoretically one could build on that
- magicalist 5y ago
  REST APIs usually have a database behind them, yes.
  - ludamad 5y ago
    That's not what I meant, I meant 'direct' as in permissioned by end users
    - thrashh 5y ago
      NFTs aren’t permissioned by end users. The person that deployed the smart contract still controls all permissions (although they can’t change it later — that is the only difference). The reason that you can trade a NFT is because the smart contract has an API written by the creator to allow it.
- setr 5y ago
  What’s the point of this ask? A blockchain’s dataset isn’t arbitrarily editable by its users — there’s a very specific set of actions you can do, which are well defined, that modify the chain in a very structured manner… just as any API sitting in front of a database would do. Obviously you can modify your local copy of the chain as you wish, even corrupting the data, but if your chain isn’t accepted by the public, your changes don’t mean shit. So you’re really only able to (meaningfully) execute those public-allowed operations
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
pradn 5y ago
The difference between a single node backed by PostgreSQL and OpenSea offering an API to interact with the blockchain is that in theory you could interact with the blockchain yourself. It's something like Wikipedia. I could run my own local cached copy by using the periodic wiki dumps. But its easier to go through the live Wikipedia.

ludamad 5y ago

Are there SQL servers intended for direct public usage? EDIT: I do understand the ubiquity of SQL servers :) I'm asking about ones that expose a good chunk of SQL to end users, since theoretically one could build on that

magicalist 5y ago
REST APIs usually have a database behind them, yes.
- ludamad 5y ago
  That's not what I meant, I meant 'direct' as in permissioned by end users
  - thrashh 5y ago
    NFTs aren’t permissioned by end users. The person that deployed the smart contract still controls all permissions (although they can’t change it later — that is the only difference). The reason that you can trade a NFT is because the smart contract has an API written by the creator to allow it.
setr 5y ago
What’s the point of this ask? A blockchain’s dataset isn’t arbitrarily editable by its users — there’s a very specific set of actions you can do, which are well defined, that modify the chain in a very structured manner… just as any API sitting in front of a database would do. Obviously you can modify your local copy of the chain as you wish, even corrupting the data, but if your chain isn’t accepted by the public, your changes don’t mean shit. So you’re really only able to (meaningfully) execute those public-allowed operations
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

pradn 5y ago

The difference between a single node backed by PostgreSQL and OpenSea offering an API to interact with the blockchain is that in theory you could interact with the blockchain yourself. It's something like Wikipedia. I could run my own local cached copy by using the periodic wiki dumps. But its easier to go through the live Wikipedia.