What actually is an RPC node? How infrastructure can make or break your DApp
In order for a DApp to function, its transactions must be verified and processed by the blockchain.
But, In order to be verified, the transactions must flow through the Solana validator apparatus: namely, the Proof of History (POH) and Proof of Stake (POS) mechanisms.
DApps ‘call’ RPC nodes to communicate their transactions to the validator apparatus.
RPC nodes facilitate the flow of information from the DApp to the validator apparatus and back. Without a well-functioning RPC layer, transactions cannot be verified and DApps cannot function.
But importantly, not all RPC nodes offer DApps the same speed and reliability. The throughput, latency, and uptime of a DApp is determined by the quality of their RPC provider’s hardware, geography, and software.
*Hardware* is defined by the # of cores per CPU and the RAM size of the RPC. Generally speaking, the more cores and RAM, the higher the validator throughput and the lower the latency.
This is why Solana RPC providers are recommended to operate nodes with no less than 16 core CPUs and 256 GBs of RAM. But, the best providers source hardware that goes beyond these recommendations.
The more *geographically* decentralized a DApps node infrastructure, the more insulated they are to any single point of failure: * issues with firmware * misconfiguration * limited server throughput
Also, generally speaking, the more *proximate* nodes are to a DApps’ users, the faster their transactions flow to the blockchain.
Syndica sources and leverages best-in-class hardware to offer both elastic and dedicated node services that simultaneously optimize for geographic decentralization and user proximity. In turn, we ensure up to 99.9999% uptime and minimal latency.
RPC providers like us write *software*, within our custom API gateway, that ingests data from DApps and communicates that data to the blockchain. RPC nodes also read data from the blockchain and provide it to DApps.
The more efficiently an RPC provider can perform these functions, the faster the DApp’s transactions can be confirmed on-chain and executed by the DApp.
Syndica’s team of engineers from companies like Messari, Blackrock, Uber, Microsoft and more optimize our data ingestion technology to ensure efficient communication with the blockchain.
Importantly, different DApps make different types of RPC calls, depending on their architecture. Some calls are more computationally expensive than others, resulting in higher latency.
However, most DApps have no way to measure the efficiency of their RPC infrastructure use. They’re operating in the blind.
This is why we built best-in-class *observability* features into our RPC infrastructure so customers can optimize for computationally inexpensive interactions with RPC nodes to offer a more seamless UX.
