# (OLD DO NOT USE) Staking Overview

Findora is an open, permissionless blockchain secured by a decentralized network of global validators running the Tendermint consensus mechanism. Like other proof of stake (PoS) blockchains, the main stakeholders in a PoS system include delegators and validators and they can earn extra FRA by delegating their tokens to a validator or staking their tokens directly to the blockchain.

## Validators

FRA token holders can earn additional FRA reward tokens by setting up their own validator, which is a special type of full node that participates in the consensus voting process to decide whether to write the next proposed block. Validators must _stake_ their FRA tokens (i.e. lock the tokens into a bond deposit which is subject to a 21 day unbonding period if the validator decides to unstake the tokens). If bonded tokens end up being used to vote duplicitiously (i.e. for two conflicting commit-vote signatures), the validator's bonded tokens will be slashed (deducted from the validator's wallet balance and burned as a penalty). Thus, bonding tokens during the staking process is critical to incentivizing honest participation in the consensus process.

Validator consensus voting follows the Tendermint consensus ruleset which is based on Byzantine Consensus algorithm for asynchronous systems. To incentivize validators to participate in the voting process, they are eligible to earn block rewards for their efforts and the block rewards paid to validators is directly proportional to the FRA staked by the validtor relative to all FRA staked network-wide.

Validators are selected from the pool of validators candidates based on the number of FRA staked. Only the validators in the top 100 in terms of FRA staked will pariticpate in the consensus voting process.

## Delegators

FRA holders who do not wish to set up a validator to direclty stake FRA to the network can instead delegate tokens to a validator to be staked on their behalf. Delegators also earn block rewards, which they will receive via the validator they stake with. However, delegators must often pay the validator a commission for this service.

## Block Rewards

Block rewards exist to incentivize secure, decentralized, robust participation by 3rd parties to create the next block on Findora. Intentionally malicious or incompetent validators who double sign transactions or offer low availability to participate in consensus voting are punished thru slashing penalties.

## Consensus Mechanism

The consensus algorithm chooses which validator can propose the next block with a frequency in proportion to a validators voting power. Blocks have to progress through the `pre-vote` and `pre-commit` process and a new block is created only when 2/3rds of validators post a commit vote.

A proposed addition of a new `Block` to the blockchain may fail if the proposing validator is offline, the network is slow, etc. If failure occurs, the network moves to another validator to propose a new block. For full details, view the Tendermint consensus algorithm white paper.


## Staking

Findora considers bonding FRA as the same as staking, and it means actors are willing to accept the rules and regulations of working on the network. Because of this, nodes with bonded FRA can participate in staking and consensus voting. This also means they are subject to penalties (i.e Slashing).

Unbonding is a process of asking users to take on some risk for the process of removing their tokens from the network. In Findora, our process involves unbonding for 21 days. As is on other Proof of Stake blockchains, the unbonding period ensures that users cannot engage in malicious activities and get away like pooling together into one node and attacking the network, engaging in long range attacks, forking the Findora blockchain et.al. During this unbonding period, FRA staking does not earn rewards, but it can unfortunately suffer penalties.

### Hardware Requirements to be a Validatator

Findora asks that potential nodes have the following hardware requirements:

#### Minimum Requirements

* RAM - 8GB
* CPU - 2 core
* Disk - 100GB

#### Recommended Requirements

* RAM - 16gb
* CPU - 4 core
* Disk - 300GB