FSM Modeling For Off-Blockchain Computation

TL;DR

This paper proposes a method using FSM modeling to identify, decide, and facilitate off-chain execution of smart contract parts, reducing blockchain costs while maintaining functionality.

Contribution

It introduces an FSM-based approach to automatically determine and generate interfaces for off-chain smart contract computation, addressing key transfer and interaction challenges.

Findings

Algorithm effectively identifies off-chain patterns

Conditions for off-chain processing are systematically modeled

Automated interface generation facilitates on/off-chain interaction

Abstract

Blockchain benefits are due to immutability, replication, and storage-and-execution of smart contracts on the blockchain. However, the benefits come at increased costs due to the blockchain size and execution. We address three fundamental issues that arise in transferring certain parts of a smart contract to be executed off-chain: (i) identifying which parts (patterns) of the smart contract should be considered for processing off-chain, (ii) under which conditions should a smart-contract pattern to be processed off-chain, and (iii) how to facilitate interaction between the computation off and on-chain. We use separation of concerns and FSM modeling to model a smart contract and generate its code. We then (i) use our algorithm to determine which parts (patterns) of the smart contract are to be processed off-chain; (ii) consider conditions under which to move the pattern off-chain; and (iii) provide model for automatically generating the interface between on and off-chain computation.