BITNATION Jurisdiction Development Update no. 15 - Release v. 1.3.1, 1.3.2 and 1.3.3

What’s New?

• Bitnation Jurisdiction Release 1.3.1, 1.3.2 and 1.3.3
• Bitnation Jurisdiction Release 1.4.1 (UI/UX overhaul)
• Team Changes, Bug Hunting, Bitrise and Pivotal Tracker
• Token Distribution Update
• TODO in the next few weeks.

Bitnation Jurisdiction Release 1.3.1, 1.3.2 and 1.3.3

The Bitnation Jurisdiction 1.3.1 which was a major release in terms of added functionalities. It was released beginning of October, but we didn’t announce the release because it had some serious bugs. Namely, the inability to log in on most Android devices. The login defect was fixed in the 1.2.3 release a few days later and an additional fix for nations not showing up was also repaired in a subsequent update which didn’t require an app store release. However, other bugs surfaced with the Ethereum contract execution - while executing many of the functions an error message appeared saying “insufficient funds” even when the funds in the wallet were not insufficient. This has been resolved in the 1.3.3 release, hence we’re announcing all 3 release functionalities and updates in this release post.

NEW AND UPDATED FEATURES IN THE 1.3.1-1.3.3 RELEASE:

• Enabled end-to-end encrypted group chat. This is a very important feature, as it allows people to do contracts for groups, not just between individuals. This allows commerce to grow, as well as dispute resolution functionalities - like the ability to bring in witnesses, mediators, and arbitrators to contract creation and negotiation.
  Existing group chat DApps include send/ request money, one time payments and subscriptions. To create your own DApps and contracts, please read our DApp engine API.
• Public Notary DApp (this is separate from chat DApps/ contracts because it’s not executed within the chat, but rather under the Identity tab). It allows you to upload, store and timestamp documents on the Ethereum chain. This includes a transaction fee, which generates Bitnation revenue.

In 2015 we built a Public Notary in partnership with the Estonia e-Residency program, which was hosted on our website and one of our most popular services, used by thousands of people for everything from marriage agreements to loan agreements, birth certificates and ownership records.

• Modified default gas price to 25 gwei (from default of 2, which was causing stalled transactions)
• Updated private chat / group chat icons

Bitnation Jurisdiction Release 1.4.1 (UI/UX overhaul)

The Bitnation Jurisdiction Release 1.4.1 will mainly be a UI/UX overhaul, making it more intuitive to use the current functionalities on the software. We’re working to eliminate the dashboard, redo the bottom menu into new more intuitive categories, and refining the general UI. The reason for prioritizing the UI/UX overhaul is to be able to onboard more active users, in order to gather direct feedback on the functionalities, generate transaction fees and grow our user and developer community. The following releases after 1.4.1 will be focused on iOS modifications to get past TestFlight, the desktop client, and enabling the reputation and arbitration functions.

Team Changes, Bug Hunting, Bitrise and Pivotal Tracker

In the light of the crypto market crash, we have opted for a smaller and more efficient team, restructured to solve more of the in-depth architectural problems over rapid features releases, which has caused bugs and delays in the past. We have also added additional tools to help become more productive. We are now doing builds in Bitrise, before testing them on Android and iOS simulators, to catch and eliminate bugs before releases, as well as to make sure the code isn’t locally compiled, which could be a way for malware to get in. In addition, the team has moved from Wrike for project management, onto Pivotal Tracker instead, an application designed to help teams submit bugs and tasks to be organized into work to be distributed to the team. With this tool we are increasing our team’s knowledge about the kinds of bugs we have to solve, and reduce the time it takes to isolate them and solve them.

Token Distribution Update

The XPAT AIRDROP has been finalized and distributed! Woohoooo! You can see the balance on your wallet in the Bitnation Jurisdiction. We’re now working on enabling the XBNX and XPAT swap, and hope to have it in motion in December.

TODO in the next few weeks:

• Release Bitnation Jurisdiction v. 1.4.1
• Adding additional functionalities to the Public Notary
• We are assembling a task force to better understand our requirements for managing content as enforced by the iOS requirements.
• Low level DApp engine API documentation for beginners
• XBNX-XPAT Swap