Introducing the Chainlink On-Chain Data Directory: Data.eth

Chainlink’s Price Reference Data Feeds are the most widely used decentralized oracle networks in the DeFi ecosystem, providing a tamper-resistant and highly reliable source of financial market data on cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, commodities, FX, indices, and more. With Chainlink Price Feeds now securing billions of user deposited funds for leading DeFi applications such as Aave and Synthetix, we are constantly working on building additional security features for our users so the DeFi ecosystem can continue to scale to secure more value. Given our security focused approach, we are proud to announce the launch of the Chainlink On-Chain Data Directory using ENS, which creates an easily-identifiable on-chain index of Chainlink Price Feed addresses, providing users with additional assurances that they are relying on and/or sending funds to the right on-chain address. The Ethereum Name Service (ENS) is a decentralized protocol for the creation of human-readable domain names that point to specific on-chain addresses or contracts. Because ENS stores all metadata on-chain, as long as the Ethereum network continues to operate, users will be able to discover and connect their contracts to Chainlink Price Feeds in a straightforward and decentralized manner. The key benefits of the Chainlink On-Chain Data Directory include: Human-readable domain names for each on-chain Chainlink Price Feed Censorship resistant discoverability of Chainlink Price Feeds using on-chain data Seamless tracking of Price Feed upgrades through on-chain ENS events Additional decentralization of the Chainlink ecosystem as a whole An open standard that any developer or project can adopt for their own protocol Currently, Chainlink Price Feeds are discoverable on both our feeds page and developer documentation. With the Chainlink On-Chain Data Directory, we are increasing the decentralization of how people can access Chainlink Price Feeds in addition to our current resources. The On-Chain Data Directory also makes it easier for various smart contracts to securely consume various Chainlink Price Feeds, as all domain names are clearly stated with human-readable names relevant to the particular feed. This is the first time a tamper-proof on-chain directory of oracle networks has been created, and we believe that this will improve both the developer and user experience of both discovering and tracking changes to Chainlink Price Feeds. How the Chainlink On-Chain Data Directory Works Leveraging the ENS protocol, Chainlink will be using the data.eth domain name to provide human-readable subdomains for each and every Chainlink supported Price Feed live on the Ethereum blockchain. Domains for each price feed can be easily accessed by simply appending the name of the price feed to the front of the domain, such as eth-usd.data.eth. Additional domain names include: The usage of data.eth subdomains ensures that even if the Chainlink feeds page and documentation experience an unforeseen issue, users can still have access to the Price Feeds they need for their smart contract applications. To utilize these domain names, users can perform a simple search on the ens.domains website, use a trusted block explorer like Etherscan, or use their own Ethereum full node to query on-demand for the current addresses of a feed solely using on-chain data. Additionally, developers can utilize these domains to track upgrades to Chainlink Price Feeds, as every change to an ENS domain generates a standardized on-chain event that developers can easily find, removing the need to manually search for changes. Results of a search for the eth-usd.data.eth on ens.domains, which resolves to the ETH/USD Price Feed contractSmart contracts can also utilize the data.eth subdomains to ensure upgrades are seamlessly supported without any integration work from developers. The data.eth domain name and its subdomains are managed via a distributed multi-signature contract, which will continue to decentralize over time through the addition of other key ecosystem stakeholders, further ensuring the integrity of data.eth subdomains. With the support of ENS, we will continue to make it as seamless as possible for users to discover and connect to Chainlink Price Feeds in a manner that’s decentralized end-to-end. Through this integration of ENS domains, we hope to standardize the usage of on-chain domain names to track mission-critical smart contracts such as price reference data feeds. This ensures that both end-users and developers have full transparency on contract updates, easy-to-identify addresses when building smart contract applications, and censorship-resistant discoverability of new and existing Price Feeds. More information on the On-Chain Data Directory can be found in our documentation page. If you’re a developer and want to integrate Chainlink Price Feeds into your smart contract applications, check out the developer documentation or reach out here. Website | Twitter | Discord | Reddit | YouTube | Telegram | Events | GitHub | Price Feeds | DeFi