I believe that among all the people who are doing Java program development now, there is no one who does not know the Spring framework. Many of the current Java applications should still be developed on the Spring framework. But in the early days of Java language programming, there was no Spring framework. In the early days, when a developer wrote a Java program, he needed to write all the functions required by the program himself. If there are some ready-made programs that implement a specific function in the market, he can also directly take them and apply them to his own programs. But in general, developers need to write all the functions required by this program, including roles and their function assignments, security management, logs, reports and other basic functions required by every application. The cost of development and operation and maintenance of software developed in this way is very high, the quality of the software cannot be guaranteed, and there will often be bugs.

A few years after the Java language, the Spring framework began to appear. This framework adopts the basic programming method of service orientation. It easily integrates high-quality programs on the market that provide specific functions. These high-quality programs provide the basic functions required by a software, such as security management, reporting and logging, and so on. When a developer needs to write a new program, he only needs to integrate various basic functions in the market based on the Spring framework, and he only needs to implement specific business logic. The software developed in this way has perfect functions and guaranteed quality, and the efficiency and quality of update iterations have also been greatly improved. Due to these premium features of the Spring framework, it later became the basic framework used by every Java software.

In today's blockchain application development market, we also need an underlying infrastructure framework like Spring. Such a framework is conducive to lowering the development threshold of blockchain applications and rapidly developing various specific applications. This is of great significance to the promotion of blockchain applications, especially because one of the main factors that currently restricts the promotion of blockchain applications is the high development threshold.

At present, the underlying chain commonly used in the development of blockchain applications is still Ethereum. Since Ethereum went online in 2015, it has gained widespread support from the developer community, and many corresponding tools have emerged, which has promoted the development of applications on Ethereum and the prosperity of the ecology on Ethereum. However, the problems of Ethereum itself have begun to limit the promotion of applications on it. The low efficiency and high cost of Ethereum are becoming more and more serious. Ethereum 2.0, which is being rolled out, is expected to solve some of the major current issues. However, the problem with Ethereum 2.0 is that it has a long launch cycle and requires a migration process, and its final effect remains to be seen. From a software engineering point of view, migrating a system that has been running for a period of time and supporting multiple applications to a new architecture, the complexity and the problems that will arise during the migration process will be very high. In comparison, developing applications on a brand new architecture is much less difficult.

In the current blockchain market, the bottom layer of every emerging blockchain technology is striving to become the next Ethereum. For a developer, he is faced with a choice among all these new blockchain bottom layers. Among various selection criteria, the threshold of application development is an important criterion. This development threshold includes both the ease of initial application development and the ease of future upgrade iterations. Therefore, among the various blockchain bottom layers in the market, if a blockchain bottom layer can provide functions like the Spring framework, then it will definitely gain the support of developers.

Such a blockchain bottom layer needs to be able to provide some basic functions like those provided by the Spring framework. First of all it needs to have a clear architectural design. Such an architecture includes various basic roles in the system and their respective responsibilities, information standards and communication methods in the system, embedding methods of functional modules, authority management of data and functions, and so on. Due to the existence of such a framework, there must be corresponding applications that provide specific functions in the market, such as distributed storage of files, identity authentication, provision of stable coins, digital asset registration, and so on. For a specific business application developer, he only needs to call various basic services already in the market on such a framework to develop specific business applications. For example, a developer of a digital asset transaction application only needs to write such a transaction smart contract, and directly call the identity authentication and digital asset service registration services.

Among the bottom layers of various blockchains in the current market, which blockchain can provide such a framework will have a much greater chance of being adopted in the market, and the chance of becoming the next Ethereum will be much greater. Among the various blockchain bottom layers in the current market, I think that the functions provided by Polkadot for blockchain application development are very similar to the functions provided by Spring for Java programs.

First of all, Polkadot has a very scalable system architecture design. Polkadot's basic design includes relay chains and parachains. The relay chain is responsible for the overall security of the system and the information transfer between parallel chains. Parachains provide specific business functions. The relay chain can support 100 parachains. Such a design is to isolate infrastructure services from specific business functions. Focusing on a parachain in a certain segmented business field can focus on the specific problems it needs to solve. Some basic requirements can be fulfilled by the relay chain. The communication between parallel chains is also efficient and convenient. Such a design is very conducive to the development of Polkadot-based blockchain ecology.

Secondly, Polkadot has greatly lowered the development threshold of the blockchain. The function of Polkadot's Substrate greatly reduces the threshold for developing blockchain. Moreover, the quality of blockchain applications developed in this way is guaranteed. This is very conducive to the generation of more types of blockchain applications. The rapid development of the Internet is largely due to the fact that the development cost of Internet applications is very low, and even a NotePad can be used to start developing Internet applications. Substrate greatly reduces the cost of blockchain development, which will greatly promote the promotion of blockchain applications.

Judging from the actual progress in the current market, there are a large number of various types of applications developed on top of Polkadot. This shows that the developer community recognizes Polkadot as the bottom layer of blockchain technology (of course, the financial support of the Web3 Foundation is also important). It can be seen that Polkadot is becoming the Spring in the blockchain ecosystem.