RP Team partnership (Patches) Part Deux
What is the work being proposed?
A continuation of the Round 11 Grant
Going forwards my focuses will be on
- Continuing to improve code architecture to support automated testing
- Continuing to add test coverage
- Saturn 0/1/2
- Onboarding more contributors as the developer experience improves.
Is there any related work this builds off of?
In the first 6 months, most progress was made in the following categories:
- CI
- I’ve added CI jobs to smartnode.git which run tests and enforce style, as well as static analyses. These pay dividends when it comes to maintainability.
- Added automated test coverage reports to smartnode
- I’ve added some small and medium test frameworks and started improving coverage
- Treegen
- v9 was developed and tested but not released as priorities shifted to working on smartnode v2.
- In preparation for v10, thorough testing of v8 and v9 was added. Medium tests now validate that the code continues to produce the same merkle root for interval v20 as we did on mainnet. Additional tests to check various edge cases and behaviors (think- smoothing pool eligiblity and opt in time, bond reductions, etc) are under development and showing strong promise.
- Smart Node v2
- Work to maintain and prepare v2 for release has been ongoing throughout.
- Code Review / Processes
- Added contribution guidelines
- Interfacing with other smart node maintainers to establish a cohesive set of processes and standards to improve smart node’s “developer experience”.
- Focusing on code review heavily to improve code quality at merge time.
In total, so far, I have been paid $6,642 LUSD for this work, and I believe this represents a high ROI to the protocol. Obviously, the GMC should liaise with the core team to determine whether it is their opinion that I merit the cost.
Will the results of this project be entirely open source (MIT, GPL, Apache, CC BY license or similar)? If not, which parts will not be, why, and under what license will they be published?
N/A
Benefit
Same as original grant.
Which other non-RPL protocols, DAOs, projects, or individuals, would stand to benefit from this grant?
None
Work
Who is doing the work?
What is the background of the person(s) doing the work? What experience do they have with such projects in the past?
Same as original grant.
What is the breakdown of the proposed work, in terms of milestones and/or deadlines?
Same as original grant. I’m hoping to scale time up and down as needed, which realistically means “up” as Saturn 0/1/2 loom.
How is the work being tested? Is testing included in the schedule?
Frankly, most of the work IS testing. The work that isn’t testing is accompanied by work that tests it.
How will the work be maintained after delivery?
The changes to core repositories remain the responsibility of the core team to maintain long term.
Costs
What is the acceptance criteria?
Same as original grant.
What is the proposed payment schedule for the grant? How much USD $ and over what period of time is the applicant requesting?
October is the last month for which I can bill hours under the current grant. Should this grant be accepted, it will pay for November through April, inclusive. The first payment shall not be made prior to the expiry of the challenge period.
In the first 6 months of this arrangement (to date), my hours were as follows:
| Month | Hours |
|---|---|
| May 2024 | 18.5 |
| June 2024 | 4 |
| July 2024 | 19.5 |
| August 2024 | 3.42 |
| September | 21 |
| (Total to Date) | 66.42 |
So, in total, $6,642 LUSD was paid to me for the work in the first six months. This number is quite low compared to the original maximum payout in the grant largely due to an unavoidable vacation travel binge.
I propose applying the same terms of the first 6 months to the subsequent ones, where I have a lighter schedule and intended to complete a lot more work.
Is the applicant requesting RPL or LUSD?
LUSD
How will the GMC verify that the work delivered matches the proposed cadence?
Verified by Langers monthly
What alternatives or options have been considered in order to save costs for the proposed project?
None to my knowledge. Staffing discussions for the core team are tangentially related, I suppose.
Conflict of Interest
Does the person or persons proposing the grant have any conflicts of interest to disclose? (Please disclose here if you are a member of the GMC or if any member of the GMC would benefit directly financially from the grant).
I am an investor in NodeSet and now Bitfly as well. I think I do a good job of wearing different hats and keeping the success of those investments cleanly independent from my work with Rocket Pool.
Will the recipient of the grant, or any protocol or project in which the recipient has a vested interest (other than Rocket Pool), benefit financially if the grant is successful?
No