NoDeSQL

A web application that allows users to manage a decentralized database in a private, trustless manner.

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Inspiration

As a team, we have always been interested in security, and we understand just how important security is to every individual who trusts another entity with their private information. However, most database storage services are centralized, which means that if a data breach occurs, it can severely hurt the financial ecosystem solely due to entitlements. The Equifax data breach in 2017 caused up to $400,000,000 of damage, and the Facebook Cambridge Analytica Breach caused a loss of approximately $87,000,000. Although these numbers are significant, they are nothing compared to potential future losses, now that the cloud storage market is predicted to reach $97.4 billion by 2022 according to AMR. Data breaches of mega companies could cause losses of billions of dollars, which is why it is important for database storage services to migrate to a decentralized environment. This is why we created NoDeSQL.

What it does

NoDeSQL is a non-relational, decentralized database service that provides users with all of the regular functions of a normal database, but in a decentralized manner. Due to its intuitive interface and the efficiency of IPFS file-sharing, it maintains the convenience of traditional options such as MongoDB and Firebase, but allows for the security of Blockstack decentralization. It has the features of a typical NoSQL database like creating, adding to, and updating databases, but it remains decentralized to remove security threats. Due to IPFS's powerful file sharing system, this website has high efficiency and surpasses traditional options due to its powerful computation methods.

How we built it

The front end of our web application was built with React, and we used fetch api and axios to interact with the back end. We used IPFS to create the decentralized aspect of our project. We used GAIA storage to store each user's specific hash and Express for our backend.

Challenges we ran into

Some of the challenges we ran into were implementing the GAIA storage, as it was our first time doing so and reading the documentation was challenging. Also, using Visual Studio Code as our code editor, using the Live Share extension added bugs to our code, making the entire process very difficult.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are very proud of having the entire back-end fully functional and the website fully deployed. This is the first time we have been able to deploy a project of ours and it has always been a goal of ours, and it has become a valid indicator in showing our work is completely done and properly complete.

What we learned

We learned how to use GAIA storage, which was very interesting to implement and we also learned about how insecure current database services are, and how we can make a decentralized approach to storing data intuitive for the common user and for web3 developers.

What's next for NoDeSQL

We would like to implement other QoL features that are present in other NoSQL databases that make using other centralized forms of databases so convenient and easy.

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