Blockchain platform, Chain, makes software open source
Blockchain technology solutions provider, Chain, has unveiled a free and open source version of its end-to-end distributed ledger platform. Chain Core Developer Edition allows users to "start or join a blockchain network, build financial applications and access in-depth technical documentation and tutorials". It also has an option to put blockchain prototypes through a "testnet" run by Chain, Microsoft, and the Initiative for Cryptocurrencies and Contracts (IC3). The version has already proved popular in the banking, insurance, capital markets and payments sectors. This comes the week after the R3 blockchain project Corda made its software open-source.

Source: Chain

Chain, a provider of blockchain technology solutions, today released Chain Core Developer Edition, a free and open source version of its distributed ledger platform that enables organizations to issue and transfer assets on permissioned blockchain networks.

For the first time, developers can download and install Chain Core to start or join a blockchain network, build financial applications, and access in-depth technical documentation and tutorials. Users have the option to run their prototypes on a test network, or “testnet,” operated by Chain, Microsoft, and the Initiative for Cryptocurrencies and Contracts (IC3), a collaboration of Cornell University, Cornell Tech, UC Berkeley, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the Technion.



Chain Core Developer Edition is the product of a deep, multi-year effort between Chain and leading financial firms to build blockchain architecture that maps to the use cases of the financial industry. Chain Core Enterprise Edition, the company’s production platform, is already being leveraged to launch innovative products by market leaders across the payments, banking, capital markets, and insurance industries.



“We are thrilled to give developers everywhere open access to Chain’s platform,” said Ryan Smith, CTO of Chain. “Chain Core Developer Edition provides a seamless end-to-end experience to design, build, and test prototypes on a system we created from the ground up to suit the scalability and security requirements of the financial industry.”



“Microsoft believes the potential for blockchain technology to digitally transform the financial industry is enormous.” said Marley Gray, Principal Architect PM and Azure Blockchain Engineering at Microsoft. “We are pleased to support the operation of the Chain testnet on Microsoft Azure Blockchain as a Service and look forward to collaborating with the ecosystem to enable financial institutions to adopt distributed ledger technology.”



“We are delighted to be one of the operators of the Chain test environment,” said Professor Andrew Miller, an Associate Director of IC3 and Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. “We have collaborated with Chain on protocol design and encourage their approach to helping developers build secure blockchain applications.”



Chain Core Developer Edition comes with a Java SDK, code samples and getting started guides, as well as installers and a dashboard interface for Windows, Mac, and Linux. In addition, Chain today published the complete technical specification of the Chain Protocol (formerly known as the Chain Open Standard) as well as a summary whitepaper. The Chain Protocol is the underlying cryptographic protocol, authored and maintained by Chain, that defines the data model, validation rules, and consensus mechanism implemented in Chain Core.