During the development phase of any effort, whether it be blockchain, a video game, or even your local theater’s summer production, rehearsal is critical to a smooth launch. The entire concept of Agile software development centers around making, testing, and improving instead of building the final product and hoping everything goes to plan.
In blockchain, an incremental approach is just as critical. And because the blockchain is all about the community, any testing needs to pull the community in from the start. This is where the concept of mainnets, testnets—and to some extent, stagenets—come into play. Each plays a part in building up a strong, battle-tested network that gives users the best experience. Let’s look into each, explore their purpose and examples of platforms using them, and then dig a little deeper by examining the Venom blockchain network’s use of different nets for development.
Mainnet
A mainnet is the final form of a blockchain network. It is the full production model, with live assets, and contains a real economy. If all goes well, all the bugs, confusing user interface elements, and inefficiencies have been identified and resolved. If a network does not use some form of testnet, these problems are often found once the mainnet is launched. This is a disservice to the community, as they bear the brunt of inconvenience at best, and lost assets at worst. There is real money, provided by real people, involved with the mainnet. A major lapse in the mainnet could hurt the community, and could easily crash the network for good if its users lose trust. The mainnet is where DeFi trading, NFT marketplaces, Web3 applications, and all elements of the thriving blockchain community take place, and it needs to operate without error.. Well known mainnets include Ethereum, Bitcoin, Cardano, Polkadot, and more.
Testnet
The “dress rehearsal” of the mainnet is called a testnet. In a sense, this is the Beta version of a video game release, in that it encourages community involvement to stress test what has been built. The testnet is not usually in early development, but rather has built up most of the features to be released and is confident the network will operate in a (mostly) smooth manner. However, this is the point of development where the network as a whole has not been extensively tested in a realistic environment, and all the interactions between features can create many unexpected issues.
Many of the major networks have launched at least one testnet, and sometimes several as major renovations are developed. Ethereum and Bitcoin have launched testnets in the past, and other networks such as Venom are currently focused on building community activity within the testnet in order to prepare for mainnet launch.
As the goal of the testnet is to find all potential issues and fix them, it’s important to have community support and diversity in activity, essentially working to explore every potential combination of actions to ensure a predictable result. Because of this unpredictability on the testnet, the tokens used do not have value, which allows typical users to essentially “practice” on the various dApps, explore trading functionality, and take large risks without real consequences. This is a symbiotic relationship, as users learn how to operate on the network, while the network itself learns what is working and what needs to be fixed before mainnet launch. Developers are also critical in this process as they move from building based on the platform’s documentation to seeing how their dApps actually behave on the network.
Stagenet
The stagenet is a bit of a unique entity, as most platforms do not differentiate between a testnet and a stagenet. Because these definitions aren’t set in stone, a “stagenet” can mean different things. For example, Monero uses their stagenet for their end users to interact with the network, while its developers focus on their testnet. Waves uses their stagenet for more fundamental experimenting before it even reaches the testnet, even testing protocol changes.
What is interesting about the stagenet is that most networks don’t separate it, instead utilizing the testnet for all testing functionality. Most stagenets are established when a network wants to separate user vs. developer testing. Also, some stagenets use tokens with full value, creating some risk to those testing. In general, stagenets are fairly rare compared to the standard testnet.
Venom Blockchain Network
As a full example, let’s examine the Venom blockchain network to see the relationship between the network types. Venom is a Layer-0 blockchain built to handle unlimited (vertical and horizontal) scalability, utilizing its Masterchain, Workchains, and Shardchains. By creating the ability to dynamically shard (it can split or merge Shardchains as needed), the network can grow or focus to continually optimize performance. The network is also focused on governance, working to ensure compliance with Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) from the start.
Instead of a general testing environment, Venom wanted to get the most out of their testnet by focusing on two strategies: Extensive documentation for developers, and structured task-based testing for users. This also eliminates the need for a separate stagenet, simplifying testing. In terms of helping developers, the docs offer step-by-step on a number of common developer processes. In addition to third-party dApps, Venom is launching the testnet with eight of their own dApps, including Venom Wallet, VenomPools, VenomScan, VenomBridge, VenomStake, Web3.World, Oasis.Gallery, and VenomPad. This is critical because it will help Venom perfect its native apps, but also represents a wide range of dApps a user would encounter in the mainnet. To ensure full exploration, Venom set up a scavenger hunt of sorts, giving users a set of tasks to complete on the network so they can get large volume testing. For the users’ part, when they complete all tasks they are rewarded with a special edition NFT from Venom.To learn more about Venom – read this Venom review.
Wrapping Up
Whether you are a user or developer, it’s important to perform due diligence when evaluating the blockchain network you’d like to explore or build in. A key element of this is seeing what development testing the network has done, including using a testnet and/or stagenet in order to stress test and improve what they’ve built. Some form of testnet is critical for the network to launch the mainnet with minimal risk, and it shows that the developing team is willing to put in the time and resources to ensure their community starts strong.
As the blockchain industry continues to grow, mature, and best practices become the norm, we can expect the testnet to become a critical element of mainnet development. It’s easy to imagine that more and more testnets will not only exist, but will ensure there is extensive documentation for developers, and incentivized task sets for individual users.