Follow My Vote CTO, Nathan Hourt, is responsible for owning a critical role in the design and development of the Graphene Toolkit, which was first built for BitShares, a leading crypto-currency that has been credited with several industry innovations.

The Graphene blockchain framework also powers the Steem blockchain, PeerPlays blockchain and Golos blockchain.

@pnc on Steemit.com shared this Graphene blockchain ecosystem mapping. Follow My Vote is featured in the registry section.

It is really cool to see all the projects and apps utilizing Graphene technology in one graphic.

Definition of Blockchain

A blockchain is an audit trail for a database which is managed by a network of computers where no single computer is responsible for storing or maintaining the database, and any computer may enter or leave this network at any time without jeopardizing the integrity or availability of the database. Any computer can rebuild the database from scratch by downloading the blockchain and processing the audit trail.

Simplified Blockchain Definition

“The blockchain is actually a way to structure data, and the foundation of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. This coding breakthrough—which consists of concatenated blocks of transactions—allows competitors to share a digital ledger across a network of computers without need for a central authority. No single party has the power to tamper with the records: the math keeps everyone honest. Forty of the world’s top financial firms are experimenting with the tech.”

Fortune.com

Delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPOS)

The Graphene toolkit utilizes a Delegated Proof of Stake consensus mechanism. This means that the difficulty of producing a block should be proportional to the stake (percent ownership) in the network.

Instead of mining (like Bitcoin and other Proof-of-Work systems) delegates are chosen by the stakeholders of the crypto tokens. Those delegates proceed to run the network with less competition and energy than a Proof-of-Work system. DPOS systems are more efficient and allow for extremely high transaction volumes, as demonstrated by BitShares and Steem.

Other blockchains to use DPOS:  Peercoin and Nxt

More on Delegated Proof-of-Stake

Learn about Follow My Vote’s blockchain voting software.

About the author: Will Long is the Marketing Manager of Follow My Vote.

The post Understanding The Graphene Blockchain Ecosystem appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Here’s how:

Step 1: Set Up A Graphene Blockchain Testnet

In this video you can follow along with Nathan Hourt, Follow My Vote Co-founder & CTO as he demonstrates how to setup a Graphene / Bitshares testnet and GUI.  The Graphene blockchain testnet will serve as a real running blockchain that you can publish contests and casts votes on. The GUI is the graphical user interface which allow you to interact with the software and see what the end user will see.

Step 2: Set Up The Stake-Weighted Voting System On The Graphene Blockchain Testnet.

Once you have set up the blockchain testnet, you will now have the proper foundation of code necessary to run the actual voting system. We created a second video to help walk you through the process of setting up the voting system so that you can test the alpha.

Step 3: Run & Test The Alpha Release

Now that you have followed the previous steps you can explore and test the blockchain voting software. If you have any questions or feedback, please reach out via our contact form or reach out to follow My Vote CTO Nathan Hourt on IRC (Our IRC channel is #followmyvote on Freenode. Nathan’s handle: modprobe)

Now Is The Time To Become A Code Contributor!

In the Follow My Vote Code Contributor Program skilled developers can contribute code to our open source project. Follow My Vote releases open source code under the GPLv3 license. Here are a few reasons why you might consider contributing:

Be A Part Of Something World Changing

Follow My Vote is positioned to disrupt the entire voting industry. . . around the globe. With blockchain based voting we can increase transparency while decreasing costs. You now have a chance to join the project that will likely be the very first end to end verifiable blockchain based voting platform. Get in in the early stages and have your name carved into history as a person responsible for helping build this revolutionary software.

Learn & Gain Blockchain Experience From The Experts.

Follow My Vote CTO, Nathan Hourt is leading the Follow My Vote Code Contributors. Nathan is one of the two architects behind the Graphene Blockchain framework which has been adopted by BitShares, Steem, and Muse.

Earn MERITs

MERITs are digital tokens that Follow My Vote is using to reward Code Contributors and help set the direction of Follow My Vote’s software development. When Follow My Vote is deciding what features to add next, or which direction to take with their products, we will run stake-weighted polls in our software to prioritize development based on market demand. These polls will be weighted in MERIT.

MERITs exist in the BitShares cryptocurrency ecosystem as a User Issued Asset (UIA). Overtime as the project grows and more people earn and hold MERITs, we will see the value of MERITs increase.  This will allow early holders to sell their MERIT profitably on the free market.

At this time, one should think of 100 MERITs as representing 1 hour of time. Developers who contribute code to Follow My Vote by resolving issues* that live in our github repository will be rewarded in MERITs.

*Note that not all issues in our github repository are eligible for MERITs. Non-eligible issues have been tagged with a “No MERITs” label. If you are interested in taking on one of the eligible issues, please place a bid by posting a comment on that issue to include how many MERITs you’d like receive for doing the work. From there, we’ll get in touch with you as soon as possible to discuss the opportunity further.

Not a developer? No worries! Our Ambassadors also earn MERITs for their time spent helping the project.

Get Involved!

Check out our GitHub repo and contact Nathan on IRC.
Our IRC channel is #followmyvote on Freenode. Nathan’s handle: modprobe.

About the author: Will Long is the Marketing Manager of Follow My Vote.

The post How To Run And Explore The Alpha Release | Video Tutorial appeared first on Follow My Vote.