EOS is a public chain for the creation of smart contracts and decentralized applications (dApps). It was designed by Dan Larimer (former CTO of Block.one). The mainnet of EOS was released on June 2, 2018.
EOS aimed to be the alternative to Ethereum as a smart contract platform with high scalability, transaction throughput, and no transaction fees. The project features a delegated Proof-of-Stake (DPoS) consensus mechanism. Through DPoS, EOS offers greater scalability and transaction throughput than traditional blockchain networks (e.g. Bitcoin, Ethereum), but to a certain extent, it relinquishes complete decentralization and censorship resistance. Meanwhile, it enables developers to use common languages such as C++ to build DApps rather than new languages like Ethereum's Solidity.
Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS) is a derivative consensus of PoS. Under this model, instead of staking tokens to be a validator, the ($EOS) token holders will elect 21 validators as blocking producers who run the network. The block producers are responsible for verifying all the transactions on the network, constructing blocks, running different processes for smart contracts, and securing the network. They are required to stake $EOS to ensure security and proper functioning. If they act maliciously, their staked token will be confiscated and they will be replaced by an alternative block producer.
$EOS is the native token of the EOS network which was initially launched on Ethereum and then moved to EOS network. It can be used for staking, governance, and other economic activities. $EOS has no supply cap. Inflation of 1% per year (the original inflation rate was 5%, changed in February 2020).
Unlike other smart contract platforms such as Ethereum, there are no fees when using a DApp or interacting with a smart contract. These feeless transactions are possible because of prepaid network resources that the developers pay for with their stake when they deploy a smart contract on the EOS blockchain.
In the traditional Web 2.0 world, developers pay for resources required for their application, such as servers, network bandwidth and domain, to deploy and run their application. The users can access these applications free of cost using their browser.
The same model is being applied here on the EOS blockchain, where the developers stake their EOS tokens in order to secure an equivalent amount of resources for their DApp. There are three resources that the developers can use on EOS:
- CPU — The amount of CPU time necessary to process transactions.
- NET — Network bandwidth required for transactions (data transfer).
- RAM — Used by smart contracts to store data on the blockchain.
Based on the size of the stake, the developers can secure an equivalent amount of resources from the EOS network to host and run their DApps. Users can use the DApp without any transaction fees. When developers withdraw their staked tokens from the network, the EOS protocol will charge transaction fees from the inflation token.
EOSIO is an open-source blockchain platform that enables cryptographically secured transaction-layer infrastructure through programmable smart contracts.
EOS is a public chain built on the open-source software framework of EOSIO. The EOS Public Network is one of many open networks that use EOSIO as a foundation.
