Pebble & Ecosystem maintenance: TypeScript core of Cardano
Harmonic Laboratories (HLabs for short) is an R&D firm born and focused solely on the Cardano ecosystem. Harmonic Laboratories supports and maintains a considerable portion of the TypeScript tooling for the Cardano ecosystem, which the majority of Cardano developers use, either directly, or indirectly via other libraries that depend on code written and maintained by HLabs. The mission of HLabs is for true decentralization to become the baseline of application development, not only a nice-to-have feature. This proposal funds two complementary engineering tracks: - **[Pebble](https://github.com/HarmonicLabs/pebble)**: the first production-ready imperative smart-contract language on Cardano. Pebble brings to UPLC a programming paradigm Aiken structurally cannot deliver, ships a TypeScript-shaped surface syntax that the largest developer community on earth already uses, and (per HLabs' published benchmarks) produces on-chain code that strictly outperforms Aiken and is competitive with Plutarch, while remaining dramatically more readable than either. - **Tooling maintenance**: keeping HLabs' TypeScript stack (`cardano-ledger-ts`, `ouroboros-miniprotocols-ts`, `plutus-machine`, `uplc`, etc.) synchronized with protocol upgrades. This stack is not optional infrastructure: it is what production projects across the ecosystem already depend on, including [Mesh](https://meshjs.dev/), [Lucid Evolution](https://github.com/Anastasia-Labs/lucid-evolution), and L2 systems like [Midgard](https://github.com/Anastasia-Labs/midgard). When HLabs ships a hard-fork update, the rest of the TypeScript ecosystem ships with it; when HLabs lags, every downstream project lags. A separate proposal funds the [Gerolamo light node](https://github.com/HarmonicLabs/gerolamo) at 5 FTE and is voted on independently. ### Duration & Milestones This proposal spans over **12 months**, throughout which there will be several deliveries and demos. Amongst the key deliveries, we note: - maintenance for an upcoming hard fork; - a production-ready, imperative and efficient, programming language for smart contracts ([Pebble](https://github.com/HarmonicLabs/pebble)). ### Total Budget Ask The estimated USD budget is of **`$1,000,000`** (or **`₳4,000,000`**) + 15% in refundable contingency (**`₳600,000`**); for a total ask of **`4,600,000 ADA`**.
Reasoning
Written after the vote was cast
What this asks for, and from whom
4,600,000 ADA for Pebble and ecosystem maintenance, the TypeScript core of Cardano tooling.
What would have to be true for this to be a good use of treasury funds
TypeScript is where most web developers actually live. If Cardano wants builders who are not Haskell specialists, the TypeScript path has to be first class and maintained.
What specifically concerns me
Nothing serious. This is maintenance of a developer on-ramp, which is exactly the category I believe treasury money is for. My general watch item on all tooling grants applies: keep it maintenance, not quiet new product development under a maintenance label.
What I am asking of the proposer if this passes
It was enacted. Publish downstream dependency counts. Tooling that other funded work sits on top of is the easiest renewal to justify, so make that case with numbers.