[Decentralized Applications (dApps)] - Crypto Academy S5 - Homework Post for Task 8 by @ozenozge
Hello to every one,
As Season 5 is about to arrive, I take advantage of this gap and move on to complete the introductory courses. Today, as always, I am here with a subject that I enjoy reading and that is very instructive for me. After meeting Steemit, I heard about dApps quite often and gained a lot of knowledge during this process. Today, I had the opportunity to reinforce what I learned with the nice lesson of dear professor @wahyunahrul and I understood dApps better.
1). What are dApps? Explain the working system of dApps? What are the differences between dApps and other applications? Explain the advantages and disadvantages of dApps? How can dApps developers promote their apps? What should we pay attention to when using dApps? How do we find the information of a DApp that we want to know? Provide the steps (Screenshot required).
What are dApps?
In recent years, applications have become indispensable thanks to smartphones. We use various applications for many different areas such as socializing, playing games, following the agenda, listening to music, and now they have become a normal part of our lives. Despite the many conveniences they brought to our lives, these practices also brought some problems. They brought with them many negative issues such as the storage of our data and the violation of privacy. If you remember, it was revealed a few years ago that Facebook, the most popular application, used data to influence the election results in the United States. In this process, with the spread of Web 3.0 and blockchain technologies, the concept of dApp emerged.
Unlike ordinary applications, dApps are decentralized and thus offer a more secure environment to their users. In addition, this decentralization gives application users unlimited freedom about their own content. For example, a post you shared in central applications such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook may be deleted or your account may be closed. But in any dApp, this is not the case.
The feature that distinguishes dApps from centralized applications is that these applications do not have a central server. dApps are products of blockchains. The most important feature of blockchains is the ability to directly connect people by disabling third parties. This peer-to-peer feature also applies to dApps. Thus, in dApps, there is no authorized institution or intermediary institution, as we often talk about in blockchain technology. This decentralized system is illustrated in the image below.
Explain the working system of dApps?
dApps are open-source software usually written on the blockchain. The codes of these applications can be seen and developed by everyone. Thus, the authority does not belong to only one person or institution. People have authority over their own content.
dApps act as interfaces for blockchain technologies and smart contracts. Here I will make an analogy to better explain dApps and their working logic. If we think of the internet as blockchain, we can think of the world wide web as smart contracts and dApps as applications like Twitter, Facebook.
What are the differences between dApps and other applications?
The answer to this question is actually pretty obvious. dApps stands for decentralized application. So the main difference is that dApps are decentralized while other applications are centralized.
Any centralized application has its owners. All power belongs to the owners of this application. It even has authority over people's accounts. For example, Facebook may remove your post for non-compliance with community guidelines or suspend your Twitter account. But in any dApp, everyone has the power. No one can access your account and interfere with your content.
Another difference is that dApps are more secure than centralized applications. A very good hacker can even hack a very popular app and steal your data. But in dApps, data is distributed across hundreds of computers. Your data is safe as it is not possible to hack hundreds of computers at the same time.
In addition, dApps are low-fee, as is a feature of blockchains that we often talk about. In other words, when you want to transfer money to a person on the other side of the world with a dApp, you have to pay very low fees. But in central systems, this fee is quite high compared to dApps.
Explain the advantages and disadvantages of dApps?
As we have often mentioned in previous questions, dApps are secure. It is very difficult to hack and therefore your data is stored safely.
dApps have a transparent structure. For example, money transfers made by users can be seen by everyone.
The control of your account is completely under your control. No one has the chance to enter your account and make changes or obtain your information.
Transaction fee is very low and fast as third parties are not involved in money transfers.
Almost all dApps with the same functionality can connect with each other.
You need to keep your password very securely in dApps. If you lose your password, you cannot access your account again.
It is not possible to undo an incorrect action. If you have transferred money to the wrong account, all the money you have sent is lost unless the other party returns it.
In any dApp project, security increases with the number of users. If a project has more users, it also means more nodes. In this case, dApps with low user counts are less reliable than dApps with high users.
How can dApps developers promote their apps?
In fact, the same methods can be used when promoting a dApp as when promoting a traditional App. For example, dApp can be advertised to traditional media outlets. Another method that is very common today is social media. These dApps can be promoted by collaborating with accounts with a high number of social media users. This dApp can be promoted by giving a promo code, or small bonuses to new users.
The methods listed above are traditional promoting methods that can be done in any product. dApps are quite innovative as they are a product of the blockchain world. Unlike traditional methods, they can also use Airdrop to promote a new dApp to users. Even people who have a chance to earn and maybe have nothing to do with the relevant dApp can start using the dApp to earn money in an easy way.
What should we pay attention to when using dApps?
As we mentioned about the disadvantages of dApps, the actions taken cannot be undone. For this reason, you should be very careful when transferring money, the account to be sent should be carefully checked. Otherwise, you risk losing your money. Since these applications are decentralized, we cannot find an interlocutor for an erroneous transaction.
Another important point is the password. The only thing that makes that account yours in a dApp is your password. The password is much more important than traditional applications. For example, when you lose your password in a social media application such as Instagram, you can recover your account by saying "I forgot my password" and providing the necessary information. But dApps do not have such a chance. For this reason, the password should be kept in a safe place and should not be shared with anyone. In addition, storing the password in more than one place will reduce the risk of losing the password.
Although dApps are the technology of the future, there is no rule that every project will find its place in the future. Unfortunately, while successful dApps will continue to exist in the future, many dApp projects will fail. For this reason, especially when investing, the dApp should be examined in detail, the relevant blockchain should be researched, and the white paper should be read carefully. If the project has hope for the future and gives confidence to its users, then it would be better to invest your money in that dApp or keep it in that dApp.
How do we find the information of a DApp that we want to know? Provide the steps (Screenshot required).
dApps are transparent and designed in such a way that anyone can easily access information. Today, the most frequently used website to get information about dApps is dappradar.com.
We can access a lot of information about dApps, such as ranking and analysis of dApps, through this site. In this post, I examined Raydium, which is a dApp that interests me. Let's explore this dApp together.
When you go to the dappradar.com address, you will be greeted with a home page like the one below. As you can see, dApps are listed here according to various groups. When you type the name of the dApp you are interested in in the search box, you can find information with the relevant dApps. That's why I typed Raydium in the search box.
After typing Raydium on the search button, we have the chance to access general information about Raydium. It directs us to the relevant dApp's page via "Open dApp" on the page. Again on this page, the rankings of the dApp are seen. The Raydium dApp is ranked 14th among all dApps, 3rd among Defi dApps, and 1st among Solana blockchain dApps.
After clicking Open dApp, it directs us to the main page of the Raydium dApp, as can be seen below.
Again, when we return to the Raydium page on dappradar.com, we can access the statistics of this dApp just below the general information. Information such as token, market cap, token price of this dApp can be found here. For advanced data, an e-mail address is required.
Conclusions
dApps are new generation applications and they offer us many advantages. Due to their decentralization, users get a secure and transparent application service. In addition, one of the advantages of these dApps is the very low transaction fee it provides during money transfer. Users have full control over their accounts and there is no risk of their information being taken and used by the application owners. The most important point that dApp users should pay attention to when using these applications is the security of their passwords. In addition, since the transactions cannot be undone, users should check a transaction before performing it and make sure that it is correct.