Chainlink. Price of cryptocurrency: $ 22.64091674

The price Chainlink today is 22.64 USD, and the trading volume in 24 hours - 1,366,575,984 USD. The crypto asset has grown by -0.56% over the day. Currently, the coin’s market capitalization is 14,192,457,979 USD, and has 0.00000000 coins in circulation with the max supply of 1,000,000,000 coins LINK.

What is a Chainlink (LINK)?

Chainlink is a cryptocurrency that aims to encourage the global network to provide reliable, real-world data for smart contracts running on top of blockchains.

Smart contracts are agreements that are programmed to execute a contract by observing certain conditions. Today, smart contracts are used for everything from creating new crypto-financial products to developing new crypto-assets.

However, the problem that persists is that most smart contracts need to rely on some external data source for the correct execution of the contract.

Chainlink was created to solve this problem by encouraging the data provider (the so-called "oracle") to act as a link, linking the blockchain smart contract and an external data source.

Oracles are interested in providing accurate data, since everyone is assigned a reputation score. In addition, when nodes follow the rules of the software and provide useful data, they receive a reward in the Chainlink - LINK cryptocurrency.

The Chainlink team, which emerged in 2017 amid a large number of projects, was able to realize its vision by expanding beyond Ethereum (ETH) amid a surge in market activity.

Since 2020, the project aims to support all blockchain-based smart contract networks.

Who created the Chainlink?

The network was launched in 2017 by the commercial crypto company SmartContract.

Co-founders Steve Ellis and Sergey Nazarov later published an official Chainlink document, with Ari Jewells, an adviser to the crypto company.

The team conducted an initial coin offering (ICO), which raised $ 32 million, by selling 35% of the 1 billion units of its LINK cryptocurrency.

As for the remaining part of the tokens, 30% were distributed in smartcontract to use the development of the Chainlink block chain, and 35% went to stimulate node operators.

How does Chainlink Work?

To facilitate interaction between users and external data sources, Chainlink divides the execution process into three separate stages.

1. Oracle's Choice: First, Chainlink users create a Service level agreement (SLA) that specifies a set of required data requirements. The software then uses the SLA to map the user to oracles that can provide the data. Once the parameters are set, the user submits the SLA and invests their LINK cryptocurrency in an order matching contract that accepts bids from oracles.
2. Data Reporting: Here, oracles connect to external sources and get the real data requested in the SLA. The data is then processed by oracles and sent back to contracts running on the Chainlink block chain.
3. Aggregation of results: The last step involves counting the results of data collection by oracles and returning them to the aggregation contract. The aggregation contract accepts responses, evaluates their validity, and returns a weighted score to the user using the sum of all the data received.

Architecture

Smart contracts of the Chainlink blockchain have three types:

• Contract aggregation-collecting information from oracles and matching the most accurate data with the smart contracts that need it.
• Order Matching Contract-corresponds to the Service Level Agreement (SLA) of the smart contract with the best bid oracles.
• Reputation Contract-checks the integrity of the oracle by analyzing its track record. This includes factors such as the total number of requests made, the average response time, and the amount of LINK cryptocurrency delivered by the oracle.

However, Chainlink also interacts with oracles that do not work with its blockchain and are independently responsible for collecting the real data requested by the contracts.