Greetings to @everyone;
It has been a long tailed development stack since the last time we had a chance to post to our forum. During that time I have taken immense steps to bring the Safex technology to new levels with monumental advancements and I believe are game changers for our field of privacy tech, our network, and the future for Safex.
In summary the main developments and updates:
- Safex.org is now a full-featured Safex Cash and Safex Token wallet, directly accessible through the web browser.
- Safex SuperSync: a foundational invention and development that powers the browser wallet while retaining the privacy and self-custody principles that are essential to Safex.
- The core building blocks for Safex transaction creation and wallet management have been implemented in JavaScript, making these tools accessible in a nimble and reusable format across web-based environments.
- SFXOS has been updated into version 3, allowing Safex mining to continue to be operated easily on dedicated hardware.
- An SFX and SFT faucet is now available for new entrants, making it easy to try out the new safex.org wallet through my personal interactivity page at danieldabek.org.
- A broadcast and update platform has been developed on danieldabek.org, dedicated to realtime updates and ad hoc live interactions. The first content there are tutorials how to user the new Safex Wallet.
- Safex Core continues to receive active development and maintenance, with ongoing improvements forming the foundation for future releases and protocol updates.
- Safex Swap is integrated into the safex.org wallet experience, allowing Bitcoin to be converted into SFX and SFT. The longer-term direction is to expand this into a broader, MetaMask-like multi-asset conversion experience.
- Active development is underway to bring the Safex Marketplace directly into the safex.org wallet, bringing the original commerce capabilities of Safex into the modern browser-based application.
- The forum is back online, up to date, and ready to continue discussions as we bring in the full access to the Safex Marketplace and beyond.
It has been a big lift, and the foundational aspects are already online and ready to play.
1. Safex.org: a full Safex wallet in the web browser
Probably the most visible development is the new wallet now running directly at safex.org.
This was something I wanted to arrive at for a long time: being able to come to the Safex website, create a wallet or restore an existing one, see your Safex Cash and Safex Token, follow transactions as they move through the network, and send and receive without installing a desktop application.
The wallet is not simply a remote interface into somebody else’s wallet server. The important cryptographic operations remain on the user’s side. Private recovery information stays with the wallet, ownership of blockchain outputs is determined locally, and transactions are constructed and signed from the wallet environment before they are submitted to the Safex Network.
It also brings much more of the network into one place. You can follow the blockchain, mempool, wallet history and Safex accounts while using the wallet itself. The public site currently exposes wallet history/accounts alongside network information such as the current block, mining rate, reward and supply. Safex
2. Safex SuperSync
Underneath the wallet is probably the largest development that people won’t immediately see: Safex SuperSync.
This came from a problem inherent in making a private blockchain wallet usable through a modern web application.
With Safex, you cannot simply give a server an address and ask it for a complete account balance the way you might with a transparent account-based blockchain. The wallet has to identify what belongs to it while maintaining the privacy characteristics of the system.
SuperSync provides a continuously maintained synchronization layer between the Safex Network and the browser wallet. It organizes the blockchain information needed by a wallet, keeps up with current blocks and transactions, and allows the wallet to restore and follow its history without handing its private keys over to the synchronization service.
The distinction is important: SuperSync assists the wallet; it does not become the wallet.
That separation has allowed me to make synchronization, wallet restoration and live network updates substantially more practical while retaining self custody.
It is because of this innovation a wallet where you control the keys entirely is made possible. I accomplished this by entirely redefining the data structures that the blockchain used to make a lightweight purposeful data structure that thinned out the necessary data in order to privately sync balances.
3. Safex transaction technology in JavaScript
Another foundational part of this work has been moving the core building blocks needed to work with Safex transactions into JavaScript.
That includes generating and restoring wallet identities, Safex address handling, recognizing SFX and SFT outputs belonging to a wallet, deriving key images, selecting outputs and constructing and signing transactions.
The result is a reusable wallet engine that isn’t tied to one old desktop application.
The public wallet-core implementation describes support for wallet creation/restoration, Safex address handling, SFX/SFT ownership detection, UTXO selection and building and ring-signing SFX and SFT transactions. GitHub
This is important beyond the wallet itself. These primitives can become building blocks for other Safex applications that need to understand and interact with the blockchain from modern JavaScript environments.
I also separated other fundamental pieces into reusable components, including Safex’s CryptoNote Base58 encoding and SWIF wallet recovery format.
4. SFXOS v3
I also returned to SFXOS, the dedicated Safex Cash mining operating system.
The original idea behind SFXOS was to make a mining machine behave more like an appliance: flash the operating system, boot the mining hardware, configure the Safex address and let it do its job.
That concept is still valuable, so I have updated SFXOS for current hardware and current Safex infrastructure.
The latest version enables mining directly to the full node, so you bypass the mining pools and mine blocks directly to your wallet. There is also a robust interface to manage the individual rig on your own network.
The development work will expand beyond the current offering and it already is prepared to accommodate mining to a pool, and future updates will enable easier management of connected rigs, and to be able to also run a full node that you can configure from SFXOS.
So far it is operational on any USB drive, though it is reportedly working on USB 2.0 or 3.1 ports with the 3.0 port malfunctioning; however, in its present state you can get multiple rigs mining directly and winning block rewards as is.
The original SFXOS announcement and support thread is still on the forum and gives some useful history on what the project was designed to accomplish.
Background: Original SFXOS forum thread
5. Free SFX + SFT starter coins
Something else I wanted to solve was the simplest onboarding problem of all:
How does somebody create a Safex wallet and actually try it?
I built the Safex faucet on danieldabek.org so a new user can enter their Safex address and receive starter amounts of Safex Cash and Safex Token.
That gives somebody enough to see a real Safex transaction arrive, watch it move through the mempool and into wallet history, understand the difference between SFX and SFT, and start learning the wallet without first having to purchase anything.
Claims are limited to three successful claims during a wallet’s lifetime with at least seven days between successful claims. The live danieldabek.org homepage currently links directly into this starter-coin flow.
The site describes the tutorial as going from wallet creation and backup through real SFX/SFT starter payments, including watching them progress from Mempool to History.
Special thanks to our active community team who rapidly funded the wallet of the faucet. I can forsee that this type of even this faucet exactly enables vendors, to stop in get some SFX to get their first listing fees funded.
6. A place for live updates, broadcasts and interaction
Alongside this work I built danieldabek.org into something broader than a personal homepage.
I wanted an independent place where I could publish technical work, write short updates, post longer articles, upload video and go live directly when there is something worth showing or discussing.
The site therefore includes Live, realtime interaction and chat, video, Notes, longer-form publishing and permanent replays of broadcasts.
This is useful for Safex development because not every update needs to wait until there is enough material for another formal announcement. I can show something as it is being developed, go live around a release or network event, and preserve that broadcast afterward for anyone who wasn’t there. The site is also crucial to secure the future of the Safex project because in the past I and the community have been deplatformed without any valid reason; this should ensure a core location to keep up to date.
The public site already exposes dedicated Live, Video, Notes and Latest sections, and recent broadcasts remain available as replays.
7. Safex Core development continues: 7.0.3 released
None of the application work replaces development of the underlying blockchain.
Safex Core continues to be actively maintained.
Recent work has included improving how staking state is recovered through blockchain reorganizations, refining daemon status and maintenance reporting, and simplifying network bootstrap/discovery while retaining the existing consensus rules.
The current public release notes explicitly document those changes and state that the release introduces no new hard fork. GitHub
This work matters because everything above it the wallet, SuperSync, SFXOS, Swap and ultimately the Marketplace still depends on a healthy and maintainable Safex Network underneath.
8. Safex Swap: Bitcoin directly into SFX or SFT
Another major practical addition to the wallet is Safex Swap.
From the wallet experience, somebody can choose Safex Cash or Safex Token, obtain a quote, create a Bitcoin invoice and send BTC to purchase the selected Safex asset directly to their Safex address.
This solves another onboarding gap. It is one thing to make a good wallet; it is another to give somebody a straightforward way to actually obtain the assets the wallet is designed to use.
The purchase flow handles the Safex destination, Bitcoin invoice, payment tracking and Safex fulfillment while keeping the wallet itself separated from the Swap service.
I also put together a complete walkthrough showing the process using a real Bitcoin payment, including paying from a normal Bitcoin wallet or an exchange such as Coinbase and following the resulting Safex payment into the wallet. The tutorial is already listed publicly on danieldabek.org.
9. Bringing the Safex Marketplace back into the wallet
And this brings me to what I consider the next large phase of development:
bringing the Safex Marketplace directly into safex.org.
The Safex blockchain was not designed only for transferring SFX from one wallet to another. The protocol already contains the building blocks for commerce: Safex accounts, offers, purchases, staking and unstaking, network fees, feedback and the other application transactions that make up the marketplace.
The work now is to take that protocol foundation, carefully address the remaining implementation improvements, and build the modern application around it.
I am currently going through areas including listing ownership and modification, feedback following purchases, numeric safety and some of the privacy mechanics involved in recognizing payments. This will enable the Marketplace Protocol v2
Additionally, at the application level there are also two problems I want to solve properly rather than bolt onto a centralized web server:
product images and buyer/seller communication.
The goal is to establish a scalable decentralized method for product media with verifiable integrity, alongside encrypted buyer-to-seller communications that do not require building another central database of everyone’s private marketplace conversations.
The direction is for the Marketplace to become a natural extension of the wallet:
create a Safex account → stake → list a product → discover products → purchase with SFX → communicate with the seller → receive the order → leave feedback
This is where my focus is now presently in full force, and I am sprinting to completing this part of the development as soon as I can. There is further need for invention and I have a good grip on what needs doing in order to bring a reliable solution that will seamlessly integrate into the familiar environment while retaining the principles of Safex and the blockchain ideology to the application.
Sum Summary:
It has been a long year and a tremendous amount of work (a lot of fun, from success, and inventions; game changing steps forward), and I want to thank everyone in the active community who has continued testing things, following the development, keeping the discussions alive and helping me work through what needed to be improved.
A lot of the foundational work is now online, and I invite everyone to go use it for themselves. Create or restore a wallet at safex.org, use the faucet, send some transactions, try Safex Swap, and get familiar with the new environment. Tell a friend!
If you want to participate more deeply, top up your wallet with some SFX and SFT and start getting ready for the Marketplace. SFX is what you will use for commerce and fees, while SFT ties into the Marketplace and staking side of the system. Using the network, testing the software and giving feedback all help move the ecosystem forward.
From here, keep an eye on the Marketplace work. That is where my focus is now in full force: activating the commerce functionality into the fingertips of the world; by bringing listings and purchases into the wallet; and continuing to build the surrounding pieces such as decentralized product media and private buyer/seller communication.
There is still plenty ahead, but the important part is that the foundation is no longer theoretical; it is online, usable, and ready for people to start working with.
Thank you again to everyone who has stayed involved through the long haul. There is a lot more coming. I will be sure to drop in more frequently with formal updates as things progress!!
Sincerely,
Daniel Dabek and The Safex Development Community