METHODOLOGY

Database: near.core.dim_staking_actions, near.core.blocks of Flipsidecrypto database. Only successful transactions are used in this dashboard.

Period and interval: can be chosen

Refresh daily

Currency: NEAR

Credit queries:

• Gini coefficient and Nakamoto coefficient for staking - pinehearst, based on this query
• Shannon entropy for blocks - kasadegh, based on this query

🧱 Block Producing

The mission of NEAR is to empower people to manage their assets, data, and the power of governance. Validators support this mission by ensuring a single entity cannot control or manipulate the way a network governs itself or manages data.

In the NEAR Proof-of-Stake network, a decentralized pool of validators process transactions to keep the network secure. In return, these validators receive a reward for doing so. This system also allows delegators – entities that would like to provide security but may not have the hardware to do – to delegate their tokens to validators.

Validators are responsible for producing blocks and the security of the NEAR network.

source

🪙 STAKING

Staking is the basis for security and stability of the NEAR Protocol. Staking is the locking up of cryptocurrency tokens as collateral to help secure a network or smart contract, or to achieve a specific result (source).

📚 Introduction

Hello, this is a dashboard the purpose of which is to track metrics in terms of validators on NEAR and validation in NEAR as a whole

What to start with?

• you can choose the time period, the interval for visualizing the charts, the name of the validator you are interested in, or do not change anything and look at the charts with the default time period and validator
• sometimes data is not loaded very quickly when changing parameters, so please be patient, make tea or coffee, wait a couple of minutes

What is this dashboard about?

As I wrote above, this dashboard is about validators and validations. But I would like to note that this is a narrowly focused information panel and there will be no information about staking in general, about delegators and other topics. Let's focus on the validation process!

Description

Below will be described the blocks that you will meet on other tabs, as well as methodology separately for each tab, conclusions will be placed in a separate tab. This is done in order not to overload the information panel itself.

Decentralization

One of the NEAR directions is aiming for is to be more decentralized. And validation is an important part of it.

How can the level of decentralization be measured?

1. Block production. It's possible to look at the breakdown of who actually executes them, what proportion of blocks are processed by the top 3 validators. Why is it important? This way it can be assesses whether the validators are colluding and how decentralized the network is
2. Staking. The level of decentralization can be measured by the count of stake pools or validators, as well as by the distribution of staked tokens between these validators
3. Calculate the Gini coefficient, which can be used to estimate the inequality in the distribution of verification powers among validators. The value is between 0 and 1, where 1 is the most equal
4. Compute Shannon entropy, which measures the degree of randomness and disorder of the distribution of the amount of blocks validated by validators. A higher Shannon entropy means a higher degree of randomness of the distribution of validating power, thus indicating a higher degree of decentralization
5. The Nokamoto coefficient represents the number of validators (nodes) that would have to collude together to successfully slow down or block any respective blockchain from functioning properly. The higher the Nakamoto Coefficient relative to the total number of validators, the lower the risk of collusion disrupting a decentralized blockchain.