Two New Tools Announced By Cardano’s IOHK

One of the biggest blockchain research and development companies in the world, IOHK has recently announced two tools designed by one of the leading teams across the globe for writing smart contracts on the Cardano blockchain.

The two tools are called Plutus and Marlowe which were launched in test format at the initial PlutusFest conference event in Scotland. These powerful tools will allow for blockchain contracts to be able to run on Cardano by start-ups, the financial services and fintech industries.

The Plutus tool provides a general purpose programming language and tools for the Cardano protocol. Some researchers and engineers at IOHK have combined the discipline of the Haskell functional language with the Cardano network to design a platform for fintech developers to design secure and sturdy smart contracts. For Plutus contracts, the blockchain research firm as provided a simple testing environment based on a novel blockchain emulator dubbed Plutus Playground.

The CEO of IOHK, Charles Hoskinson has explained that the Marlow application provides instant global fund transfers for business. As reported by CCN, it also allows the holding of rental deposits in escrow to increase transparency. Hoskinson stated:

“As an example: The escrow mechanism allows Party 1 to deposit the money into a contract, in a way that the money will only be released when two out of three participants agree on whether Party 2 has indeed given Party 1 the item. The escrow participant (Party 3) is supposed to be a neutral third party that decides in case of dispute. This way if Party 1 and Party 2 are honest, they will just agree on the result of the transaction and Party 3 will not need to do anything. If Party 1 and Party 2 disagree, Party 3 will be able to choose whether the money must go to Party 1 or to Party 2.”

To put this into context, the founder said that if the money paid for Item A is 450 ADA and it must be committed by Party 1 before block 10. With this, part 1 will be refunded if there isn’t a consensus before block 90.

The other tool is Marlowe is for non-programmers and is an easier way to generate code and create software products. The easy to use that enables professionals in the finance industry who have no programming background to build automated financial contracts on the blockchain. Marlowe comes with its own web-based testbed, Meadow.

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