With an imminent release of EOS Dawn 3.0., I thought now would be a good time to look into inter-blockchain communication (IBC) as this development branch is expected to be included on the Dawn 3.0 MAT test net.
An IBC metaphor, I came across recently is "Interchain communication is the highway and in the city there is public transportation and more business opportunities" - Dan Larimer
Sometimes referred to as cross-chain transactions, inter-blockchain communication as the name implies is transacting between blockchains, moving tokens from one blockchain to another. This interoperability between blockchains relies on a light client version of Merkle proofs, the technology at the heart of all blockchains derived from an invention by Ralph Merkle.
There are a number of use cases and projects that could utilize EOS inter-blockchain communication and the technology could potentially make it easier for existing Dapp projects utilizing ERC20 Tokens on the Ethereum blockchain to port over to EOS. Creating tokens on the EOS blockchain that inherit properties and balances from tokens on the Ethereum blockchain would make a useful tool.
Technical details on inter-blockchain-communication can be found in the EOS technical whitepaper:
https://github.com/EOSIO/Documentation/blob/master/TechnicalWhitePaper.md#inter-blockchain-communication
For a more detailed in-depth technical look try Dan's post here:
https://steemit.com/eos/@dan/inter-blockchain-communication-via-merkle-proofs-with-eos-io
EOS Bangkok is a meetup group focusing on EOS blockchain technology.
https://www.meetup.com/EOS-Bangkok/
nice work, John. So freaking excited for EOS! Can't wait to see the next public releases until June 1st. 100% upvoted :)
Having the mainnet now up and running, have you any added thoughts to this? I know Bancor is working on bridging multiple chains in order to provide further liquidity. Love your article by the way..