Everything you need to know about the Routers Track of the Contributor Program
<aside> <img src="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/secure.notion-static.com/4cdfe998-fa21-4d39-937b-178a14fb0fe0/Connext-logo.png" alt="https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/secure.notion-static.com/4cdfe998-fa21-4d39-937b-178a14fb0fe0/Connext-logo.png" width="40px" /> TL;DR: The Connext routers are the backbone of the network. They provide liquidity and relay data, so it’s critical for Connext that they get the best experience possible, and this track aims to build processes and tools exactly for that.
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The Contributor Program is a way for leaders in the community to step up and help push Connext forward in different ways. Connext’s official announcement gives you a detailed explanation of what the Contributor Program is. Here’s a summary:
The Contributor Program is a community incentive program designed to encourage community members of different backgrounds and skillsets to steward and take ownership of key aspects of our ecosystem. The program consists of 5 Tracks (Community Leadership, Builders, Content & Education, Routers, and Grants), that are operated by Track Operators, experienced leaders within the community that are not part of the core team.
<aside> 💡 Participants of the program will be given points based on the quality of their contributions to the ecosystem using evaluation criteria developed by Track Operators. When the NEXT token goes live, we plan to submit a proposal to the Connext DAO to retroactively reward participants proportional to points received.
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<aside> 💡 Be sure to join Connext's official Discord server to receive updates about the Content & Education track: https://discord.gg/connext, you can find us in the channel #router-track
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Routers are the liquidity and infrastructure providers of the Connext network. Their main purpose is to relay funds and calldata across chains. In exchange, they receive fees for their services.
<aside> 💡 Routers in Connext are not validators of a blockchain: they don’t have to guarantee the security of the system as our architecture relies on smart contracts and on Nomad, an optimistic communication protocol. With Nomad, users and protocols sending funds/data from one chain to another need to wait for 30 minutes for the operation to be successful. Connext routers speed up the process: they front capital and execute calls for a user’s transaction, and then claim against funds going through Nomad after 30 minutes. Read more.
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As this is a technical track, we are looking for individuals who are very experienced with running infrastructure for other networks and who are economically/philosophically aligned with the network. Being able to understand the technical documentation is a good check you can use.
You will be running the testnet, and then mainnet, of Connext, becoming a subject matter expert on the project and cross-chain infrastructure in general.
This involves you getting exposure not only to the infrastucture of web3 (Nomad, the Graph, Gelato), but also to multiple ecosystems that Connext integrates with (14 chains and counting). Get ready to run the true Internet of Blockchains.
Your mentors for this track are Matei and Konstantin. We will be onboarding you into the program and will assign tasks to you if necessary. But most important of all, we will be available if you have any kind of question about the program.
