Great article by Jordan Andrews, lead Smart Contracts dev at Stratis, on modularity in blockchain development:
https://hackernoon.com/the-importance-of-modularity-in-a-blockchain-platform-f9af03b80b80A few quotations which stood out to me:
"Now it’s important to note that in the case of Bitcoin, modularity isn’t a priority. If you believe you’re building the singular “currency” of the future, why make it easier for others to build with your code? Bitcoin Core is highly integrated, but it has stood the test of time and it works. This is not a criticism of Bitcoin Core’s codebase."
"The most exciting thing about Stratis for me is we’re thinking about building blockchains radically differently. Different consensus algorithms, smart contract executors, wallets, and two-way peg implementations are all features in the one codebase.
Currently you can run — all from the one codebase:
A Bitcoin (PoW) node
A Stratis (PoS) node
A Cirrus (PoA + smart contract) node."
"Moreover, because of how flexible the node is, I’m confident we could build out integrations for Bitcoin Cash, Gold, Private, Doge, Litecoin, etc. in days each. Down the road we could extend this to support even more chain types easily, after some foray into the account model and other features."
Stratis' approach in this area is one which could give them a huge competitive advantage.