Dexalot AMA #2 — Technical Deep Dive with M. Nihat Gurmen (CEO) & Cengiz Dincoglu (CTO)(Recap)
On 2/21/2022 at 12:00 p.m. (PST), an AMA session was held on Avalaunch with special guests M. Nihat Gurmen (CEO) & Cengiz Dincoglu (CTO) , Team Dexalot. Below we present to you an excerpt from AMA with questions and answers.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Our first AMA with Dexalot was so darn good, we had to do it again. We…had….to. Had we not, I’d feel irresponsible for denying our information hungry community what they deserve. Alas, we are here and joined once more by the @the_axol0tl and our friendly neighborhood @hydrofoilracer. They are long time friends and workmates who have joined forces in creating their magnum opus that is Dexalot. Gentlemen, good to have you here again today and welcome.
How is everyone doing?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
Doing great, nice to be back 🙂
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Doing great!
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Good to have you both back.
Let’s get it started — Given the exposure you’ve been getting, I’m sure you’ve done this numerous times already but once more, could you please introduce yourselves and how you got to be where you are today?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
We feel very energized with the interest we have seen so far!
Sure.. let me start.
Hello Everyone. Thanks for having us here again. I am one of the co-founders of the Dexalot project. I have a PhD in Chemical Engineering. I am coming from a corporate background in the Oil & Gas sector.
I always inclined to do projects that have programming, innovation and collaboration in my corporrate and academic life.
Crypto ended up combining all of that for me again. So, I jumped into Avalanche and Dexalot with both feet.
Quicksilver| Dexalot
I am the CTO and the other co-founder of this project.
I have worked in Wall Street for almost 20 years building electronic trading systems on the IT side and I have also held a quant position at JPMorgan’s Statistical Arbitrage Trading Desk.
This is my 5th trading system in the last 20 years.
I left WallStreet 3 years ago as I didn’t see the upside for myself and kitesurfed and hydrofoil raced for almost 2 years while keeping my entrepreneurial aspirations alive with a few non-crypto projects.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
An introduction that never fails to impress. Thank you for that. Many people might be curious about the Dexalot team, how many people are behind it, and how many are developers dedicated to work on the exchange?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
We have about 16 people if we count all full-time and part-time people including visual designer, community admins, social media team.
4 out of the 16 are at the executive level. Including Cengiz and I, the core team has 6 developers.
and yes, co-founders code in this project.
Additionally, we work with a group for additional project-based engagements. They have built a monitoring application to detect malicious actors and behaviors on Dexalot.
We are very excited to introduce this montioring app in the near future…
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
How does having such a varied team provide you with the tool set required to run something as complicated as a DEX? Is the entire framework developed from the ground up, or is this based on a whitelabel solution structure?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
We built everything from scratch.
They include smart contracts, frontend, backend, database and market makers.
Having personally built multiple custom trading systems in the past makes a tremendous difference in the end result. From the start, I pretty much had the end state architecture in my mind, but we got there gradually , re-confirming the architecture based on the needs at the time.
In a way we evolved into our current state. We are in a good state but we have a lot more in out plate to do…
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
An exchange that aims to change the game from the centralization perspective is quite a statement. What does the architecture look like?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
In a nutshell, because all trading activity is on chain, all you need is a frontend and our smart contracts.
But we have a very complex backend that supports all the bells and whistles needed to give the CEX experience in the frontend like candle charts, orderbook aggregation, historical transactions etc.
We have a relational database, a blockchain indexer, in-memory database with a pub-sub mechanism, web-socket and REST api endpoints to achieve the features we are providing.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Having looked at the anatomy of the exchange, market and limit order functionalities are available. Will futures be part of the architecture?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
In the near term, the answer is no. Derivatives are classified as securities in the US, we are staying away from regulated securities for the moment.
However, we have expertise in derivatives within the team and will keep all such products in mind for the future and depending on changes to regulations.
There are many other cool ideas that we’ve brainstormed on and we’ll reveal them over time.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
How does Dexalot deal with privacy concerns? How is this system analogous to centralized exchanges but still maintaining the make-up of a decentralized platform?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
All the backend components are somewhat centralized BUT they serve complementary functions.
Even if the entire backend crashes, user funds are on chain under their own custody. They can technically withdraw their asset without even needing our frontend directly from snowtrace.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
With over $15M in the total volume locked, safety and security must not be taken lightly. Have there been any smart-contract audits, what about penetrance tests? What are your plans for the continued due diligence?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
We fully agree that security is of paramount importance.
To this end we tried our best to use well-audited libraries of OpenZeppelin to build on at the smart contracts level.
We also did two private security audits and three public security audits by Hacken. We plan to trigger a security audit whenever an update is done for smart contracts.
Additionally, we did extensive hardening at the infrastructure level to increase the resilience of Dexalot in this age of distributed attacks and scanners, etc.
We will soon announce a bounty program as well to encourage community members skilled in security to contribute to the project.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
In the lightpaper, the roadmap indicates that the next developmental milestone is a subnet on Avalanche. What were the core reasons for this, and how do you see this play an advantage in user adoption?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
2 words:
Gas & Speed
We will be focusing on the Subnet because we can control the gas cost better and will have tremendous speed improvement in addition to giving us much needed flexibility to deliver additional features.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Boom
Just like that
Is there a mobile app on the way? If so, will this be a full featured app or will these be added in phases?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
Our website is already compatible with mobile phones
Simply login through MetaMask and app.dexalot.com to start trading today.
But we don’t have a dedicated native mobile apps.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
final question for this section but save your denouement for later please. What does the support structure look like, and what’s the expected response time?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
We various ways for users to reach out for support. We have multiple channels: TG, Discord, email.
The turnaround time for TG and Discord should be in the order of minutes and email can take longer.
Our email support queue has automated acknowledgment for every email received. Then one of our staff picks up from the queue and tries to resolve it. If a legitimate bug has been reported then we may not be able to have a resolution quickly as it involves coding, testing, etc.
Certainly depending priority we fast track certain bugs as fast as possible.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Thank you for your resolve and determination in navigating the first leg of this journey. You are appreciated. Now, we must move on to where few dare to go (much like your journey as a DEX) and that of course is the Twitterverse.
Twitter Questions
@Sayangk34486540 who asks — Is your project only for elite investors, what about others with small funds, is it open to everyone?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Absolutely not. The whole crypto experiment is about people taking control of their own assets and removing middle layers to do transactions more and more peer to peer.
From that perspective, Dexalot follows the same model. It is non-custodial, trustless and everything is transparently on-chain.
Moreover, the on-chain order book allows programmatic interaction for any builder so it is very inclusive.
@PiloT9804 inquires — I see you’re on Beta mode- is it safe to Trade on Dexalot? And when will more token pairs be available for trading?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
Fair concern. Our code was built from scratch.
Therefore, we wanted to make sure the project gives a heads up to the users via a beta designation. However, we did a lengthy fuji testnet period.
Currently, we have more than 0.5M transactions on it. The mainnet has been used to log 115k transactions with real assets.
We also have our contracts audited 5 times so far. Therefore, we believe it has a good track record. In the next few months we will gradually increase our pairs.
@alialicinar3 — Are you considering new features such as staking and lending other than swap?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
For our own token there will be a staking feature. We hope to bring it to the market shortly after our TGE.
However, we do not have any plans to introduce any staking and lending protocols for other assets in the short term.
@A9R8VI Within Dexalot, “All orders and canceled orders placed on Dexalot are recorded directly onto the blockchain and displayed on the central limit order book” So up to how many days of data & history will be Recorded on Dexalot?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
We index everything that happens on chain to our database for quick access and display.
A trader’s entire history can be retrieved from the frontend with a few clicks. We had our US customers in mind, when it is time to do their taxes along with other features that require historical data.(Like charts)
@AndikaA25245812 — The concept of Dexalot is an innovative one, providing a service which the community has been looking to get on DEX for quite some time. Do you have plans of integrating other chains in the future, like lets say, the BSC?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Currently, we have no plans for that. But if our community prefers us to be multichain then we will put this in our list to do for sure.
Telegram Questions
What is the most ambitious goal of your project? Could share with us any Upcoming Updates?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
The whole project is quite ambitious 🙂 but I would say Dexalot Discovery is the next one coming into the mainnet with our own ALOT token this week where we will be providing a solution to the crypto world a safe & fair initial price discovery process removing the arbitrage bots’ speed out of the question that is an important factor in the current process.
Since NFT is popular nowadays, is there a plan for NFT integration?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
We don’t plan on integration for NFT because there are already a few good applications that are out there that serve this purpose. As we believe in decentralization, we also believe in the decentralization of responsibilities among different projects and yet keeping a tight partnership with them.
Do you have any plans to attract non-crypto investors to join your project? Because the success of a project attracts more investors who haven’t yet entered the crypto world. What are the plans to raise awareness about your project in the non-crypto space.
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Yes, actually we have plans for attracting non-crypto investors into the crypto world. We have included people in our a team seasoned in tradfi and we are using their expertise to achieve that.
A common problem is that nowadays most investors are only interested in initial profits and ignore long-term benefits! So can you give them some reasons why they should buy and hold your tokens in the long term?
Quicksilver| Dexalot
Well we are truly in this business to make our product to go to DEX. WE have a sound revenue model, very good technology and with the introduction of the subnets, we can truly deliver CEX experience (speed/cost) with the full security advantages of DEX
Do the token holders have right to participate in the governance of the project? On what kind of decisions can they vote on about the project?
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Yes, governance is central to our project’s goals. We will have an on-chain governance feature coming in Q2 later this year.
Dave Donnenfeld | Avalaunch
Once again, it’s been a pleasure having you both. Your presence is very much appreciated and your dedication to Daddy Avalanche and its denizens is laudable. We are proud of our integration and to be hosting your sale; having had a working relationship for some six months now. It has been a long time coming.
@the_axol0tl and @hydrofoilracer and @FireStorlvl are absolute rock stars. Your contributions are something we all look forward to.
The Axolotl| Dexalot
Thank you very much everyone.
Quicksilver| Dexalot
Thank you very much and has been a pleasure as always
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Dexalot AMA #2 — Technical Deep Dive with M. Nihat Gurmen (CEO) & Cengiz Dincoglu (CTO)(Recap) was originally published in Avalaunch on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
