Blockchain Commons’ technologies are built by a Trust Architect: Christopher Allen. They are intended to fulfill the Gordian Principles as well as a variety of additional design philosophies and design patterns.
Gordian Principles
The Gordian Principles are, in short: independence, privacy, resilience, and openness. They are intended to support self-sovereignty (the ability for a user to control their own digital destiny) and for it to be safe (because self-sovereignty can be scary with no one to back you up).
The internet has become full of sharks who want to control your assets and your identity. Self-sovereignty (and the Gordian principles that it illumintes) ensures you won’t be eaten alive.
- For more, see the Gordian Principles
Design Philosophies
Design Philosophies are big-picture ideas that are built into our work to have specific effects. Though our specifications are ultimately built to fulfill the Gordian Principles, design philosophies offer the big-picture strategies that we believe will fulfill those goals.
- For more, see the Design Philosophies page
Design Patterns
If design philosophies are the big-picture, strategic ways to ensure that specifications and applications meet the Gordian Principles, then design patterns are the small-picture tactics. We haven’t fully laid out design patterns, but we’ve described what they are are and also laid out some patterns for the Heterogeneity philosophy.
- For more, see the Design Patterns page
- For examples, see Authentication Design Patterns
Macro-Architecture
As Above, So Below. Before we started developing specifications to improve digital ecosystems, we focused on the Bitcoin ecosystem and how a design philosophy of Heterogeneity (or Partition) could improve its security. Many of our original reference apps worked toward this goal. The architectural macro-design for the Bitcoin ecosystem remains a strong foundation for services, and one we suggest our partners adopt as they incorporate our specifications into their own applications.
- For more, see the Macro-architecture page
Links
Why We Do This:
- Gordian Principles
- Musings of a Trust Architect (Blockchain Commons blog)
Further Explanations: