No one can deny the 0x protocol has made an impressive impact in the cryptocurrency world already. A lot of projects have been built on top of this concept already. With the ecosystem growing and more Dapps getting built, interaction with 0x relayers becomes all the more important. Until now, there was no particularly convenient solution in this regard. The 0x Standard Relayer API may potentially change all that moving forward.
Interacting with 0x Relayers Through an API
In the world of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency, APIs have quickly become the go-to solution for providing services and access to specific features. Virtually every major cryptocurrency platform available today has some form of API that users and developers can tap into. The 0x protocol is no different in this regard, as it now has its very own Standard Relayer API. This new tool serves many different purposes, including providing a more convenient interaction with relayers themselves.
Given the nature of the 0x protocol, such an API will be incredibly powerful moving forward. While the API is still in the early stages of development, there are some promising signs on the horizon already. The application program interface introduces a new set of defined methods of communication between the relayer and a program. It is mostly comprised of HTTP and WebSocket endpoints, according to this Medium post. For relayers, there will be a way to opt in to implementing this API, although there is no real incentive or requirement to do so under the current framework.
At the same time, it is of the utmost importance to give applications access to multiple liquidity sources right away. Without proper liquidity, there is no benefit to using 0x over centralized solutions right now. The API will connect multiple sources of liquidity with one another at the same time. This will be of great benefit to app developers making use of the 0x protocol for different purposes.
According to the team, this new API provides many advantages to relayers and others to improve the appeal of their individual trading platforms or cryptocurrency-related services. New relayers entering the market will also be able to interact with traders without any mandatory software or tool upgrades. That’s an interesting development, as simultaneous backward and forward compatibility is not something most people would expect to see in the world of cryptocurrency.
It is evident the cryptocurrency ecosystem as a whole stands to gain a lot from protocols such as 0x. Although there is still a lot of work to be done, the future is looking bright. That doesn’t mean the 0x protocol and its new API will be an unprecedented success, mind you. This new API certainly moves things along in the right direction, but the 0x protocol will not necessarily replace traditional exchanges overnight either. More competition is needed to create a decentralized trading ecosystem in the future.
It will be interesting to see what other developments arise in the world of cryptocurrency. APIs have proven to be incredibly successful features as of late, although they are not necessarily decentralized either. Over the years, we have seen multiple important APIs go down due to issues of some sort. Embedding such solutions into decentralized projects should help alleviate these concerns. Only time will tell if that happens, though.
